I Fall(out) to Pieces
by Diresquirrel
Summary: War... War never changes. In the year 2076, Europe is consumed in war. Muggle Britain stands mostly intact, but it will not remain so for long. Concurrently, Magical Britain denies the return of the most feared wizard in generations. In all of this, what is UK-13? And what does it have to do with Harry Potter?
1. Chapter 1

HELL-LOHH Citizens! This is your **HOLLYWOOD-VOICE NARATE-O-TRON 7000** speaking. The story you are about to hear is a story of **SCIENCE**! Well, **SCIENCE**! and magic. Yes, there will be plenty of "magic" as we follow the lives of our friendly neighborhood BOY-WHO-LIVED, but this is ultimately a story about **SCIENCE**!

...

...

...and magic.

But now faithful citizens, Listen closely to the thrilling tale of adventure and suspense, and **SCIENCE**! as I, your **HOLLYWOOD-VOICE NARATE-O-TRON 7000**, recount the story of the legendary VAULT UK-13! Listen as our dashing heroes and stunning heroines survive the fallout from the cowardly attack by those pinko commies. Keep your ear close to the speakers as I relate the adventures and troubles of **SCIENCE**! I mean, **VAULT UK-13**! in their battles against hunger, Ghouls, dark wizards and giant gangster-hunting hedgehogs! (Giant gangster-hunting hedgehogs that were created by science.)

…

Science?

Wait, who's been adjusting my volume dial when I wasn't looking? Let me just turn this, adjust that. Science? No, not quite. Flip this switch and... _**SCIENCE**_! Perfect!

Yes, created by _**SCIENCE**_!

Ah, much better.

And listen as they venture forth from the vault only to find a world transformed from what they used to know. Some enemies wear the same old faces, while some old friends don't wear faces at all!

…

…

…

_**SCIENCE**_!

* * *

Prologue:

13 August, 2076

"So why are we going to the clinic again?" Harry asked.

"Boy! If you weren't so freakish you'd realize the Americans are at war and it's only a matter of time before we get pulled in," Vernon growled back like a wounded bear. The clinic was the local medical center, not a full hospital, but capable of taking care of the usual suburban cuts and bruises. It served as the local blood bank and held a number of other services. The Dursley's had taken him there for an eye examination, for his broken arm that one time he "fell out of a tree" and for a few bumps here and there. They had not, however, ever taken him so that all four of them could get blood tests. "And then those godless commies are just waiting to drop nukes on us all!"

"I did know that, I'm just not clear on why _I'm_ here," Harry said sullenly. He had thought this summer would be different, him having a new escaped prisoner godfather to threaten them with.

"Because _all_ families need to be tested," Petunia snapped back as if she were talking to an idiot. "It's the law. And otherwise, they wouldn't be able to sort us for our Vault."

"I haven't exactly been keeping up with the BBC these past few months," Harry replied dryly.

"Watch your tone, Boy!" Petunia snapped. "You might think you can threaten us, but your godfather isn't here right now!"

"Why should I even get tested?" Harry asked.

"Because if _any_ member of a household refuses, the entire household loses their ticket," Petunia replied. "And if you think you're going to back out just to let us die when the commies bomb us, you've got another thing coming and none of your freakishness could help you."

"You'd be surprised what I could pull off," Harry replied under his breath, a low mutter that not even Dudley, who had been stuffing his face with Dandy Boy Apples in the seat next to him, could hear.

They arrived as the clinic a little after one. The entire place was filled with cars and people. The Dursley's parked their BMW Hovercar 5 and stepped out. Harry absently noted how much the car lifted up once Vernon and Dudley had stepped out. Dudley, at 14, was almost as large as his father and that wasn't a matter of muscle either. The doors opened with a whoosh, a wheel spinning and the steel frame collapsing into the floor, only to close quickly behind them.

It had always amused Harry to watch his short tempered uncle wait in a cue. The shoe started tapping first. Then, like clockwork, the obese man's meaty paws would start to clench and unclench. Not long after the fist clenching was the grinding of teeth, the mumbling and the grumbling. Vernon had just reached the head of the cue when he finally reached the growling stage. Harry waited diligently for his relatives to finish first.

"Name?" a pretty young nurse asked. She sounded tired as she held out a clipboard in front of her.

"Harry Potter," he replied.

"Occupation?"

"Student."

"Parents?"

"James Potter and Lily Evans," he answered. "They're dead."

She flashed him a brief sympathetic look, but quickly flicked her eyes back down to the clipboard. "Household then?"

"Dursley's," he replied, nodding to the gigantic men and the spindly woman. "I'm their nephew."

"You poor boy," she said. She nodded to where a number of other children and younger teens were cuing up. "Line number two. Perhaps a 20 minute wait."

"Thank you," Harry said as he moved over to the line. Harry didn't chat with the others in line. He barely said anything. He waited patiently until his turn was up, hearing his uncle waiting most impatiently in another line. Dudley was whining about having to stand around and Petunia was promising him gifts and treats like she always did. Eventually, as the Dursley's line vanished into another room, Harry made it to the head of his cue.

"Papers?" the white clothed individual asked, barely looking up at him. Harry thrust the papers into his face. The man glanced barely at the papers and nodded. "Right, lift up your sleeve."

Harry did so and a moment later the man jabbed an excessively large needle into his arm. The plunger was pulled out, and the syringe filled with red blood. A sticker with Harry's name, birth-date and place of residence was slapped on the side before it was stored away in a cooler. The gave him a tiny bit of spray-on stimpak and sent him back to the clinic lobby.

"Bloody waste of time and money, National Health is," Vernon grumbled as they slowly made it back to the car. Harry quite diligently slowed his pace to allow the Dursley's to reach the hovercar first. "Taking blood when they should be preparing for war. We should march the fools right out of Parliament!"

They drove back to 4 Privet Drive to their normal house in their normal neighborhood and Harry was, as usual, assigned the abnormal task of weeding the garden. Normally this wouldn't be so _ab_normal, but the Dursley's were the only family in the neighborhood who didn't use a Mr. Handy. The Dursleys were _anything_ but normal.

The next day was much the same but with less excitement. The day after that blended into the next until Harry had all but forgotten all about the clinic. He returned to school at the end of the summer to his education in magic, putting the communists, politics, whispers of war, and the rest of the muggle world behind him until he was forced to return in the spring.

* * *

The blood rolled down the automatic processor, with a small sample removed for testing. The sample was split into three smaller portions by a Mr. Handy, who then entered one into the DNA Analysis Machine, another into a recorder, and a third into cold storage. The rest of Harry Potter's blood rolled down to be stored away for later use and retesting.

When the DAM was finished, a dot matrix printer creaked, sputtered, whined and grinned as it spit out a result. A Vault-Technician ripped the paper off the reel and glanced it over.

Pulling out a red marker, he wrote "UK-13" in big letters across the report before passing it to an assistant for filing.

* * *

.

.

.

.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: First of all, I don't own Harry Potter and I don't own Fallout and I don't own anything else you might recognize in this story.

I wrote this as my NaNoWriMo attempt. While I wrote enough, I did not finish the story. So I'll update regularly for a while before slacking off for a while.

For those who are going to ask, yes, this takes place in the Fallout Universe. No, I will not be following the games. This is Fallout in the UK with Wizards. It will not be the Wasteland you are familiar with. Things will be different, but similar enough so that they fit. And yes, this does start at the end of the Great War.

Because War... War never changes.


	2. Chapter 2

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter 2**

* * *

Voldemort had returned.

Harry knew this the last four years, but that had been a wraith; more than a ghost, but less than a spirit; horrific, but weak. Scary enough for an eleven year old, but this was different. The entire Tri-Wizard tournament had been manipulated into letting Voldemort return with the blood of his most feared enemy.

Harry had been thinking of that ever since the night he returned from the graveyard.

There had been fear in Voldemort. Fear of the unknown; fear of Lily Potter's magics; fear of Harry himself. It was the only explanation for the circus and convoluted plot Tom Riddle had put together. Voldemort had plenty of enemies. It would have been child's play to find an unwilling volunteer that opposed the dark wizard. But Voldemort had not settled on that. He didn't settle on the already captured Moody, who could be counted as nothing less than Voldemort's enemy. He didn't settle on blood from one of the many light families that had opposed him in the past. Instead he bent over backwards to shove Harry into place.

Because Voldemort _feared_ him.

There was just a tingle of pleasure at the thought of being feared. And that pleasure made Harry feel nauseous. The idea that he could-

Harry cut off that line of thought as fast as he could manage. Instead he turned back to the situation at hand. His Blood.

It always seemed to come down to the blood.

Staring out the window of the hall, he specifically refused to meet the worried glances of those around him. He could feel their eyes on him. There was fear there, worry, concern, disbelief. He could, on some level understand those feelings. They were the feelings he had that first year when he realized his entire world was changed, warped and twisted around.

When the world changes, people don't instantly change, and sometimes the world changes much faster than people can adapt. The concept for his generation, save Hermione and maybe Ron, was almost impossible. Voldemort was an aspect of the past. They'd been drilled into the same petty fears and stupid unwillingness to speak the name, but there was little meaning for them. They didn't understand _why_ the older generations feared Tom Marvolo Riddle's moniker. They heard that he killed people, but almost none in the school today were old enough to be emotionally connected with anyone who died at Voldemort's wand.

Harry was different. Day after day, week after week, month after month, Harry knew the creature that murdered his parents still existed. Existed and was now walking around in a new body, restored from whatever it was Lily Potter did to him.

He saw the green light when he closed his eyes. He heard his father tell them to run and then the thud on the stairs. He heard his mother cry out. He remembered the wand.

In his dementor inspired trip down memory lane, Voldemort never had a face. He was cloaked in black with a hand just a few shades off from ivory. With _that_ wand.

Now he had other memories to add to the mix. Cedric. Cedric the Spare.

Then the circus. Ringmaster Tommy showing off to all his Death Eater clowns.

Voldemort's fear had to make Harry's death a spectacle, a symbol of Voldemort's power. To do otherwise would threaten his position as an invincible dark lord. The very thought that Harry had survived was enough to weaken the illusion.

Harry just wished that weakness had not been at the cost of an innocent life.

* * *

"What do you think about the War?" Hermione asked him on the way home that spring. She'd been trying everything she could to get him off his Diggory-Death Brood. She and Ron had tried quidditch, school studies, Sirius and Professor Lupin (which both backfired spectacularly since this brought up thoughts of Peter Pettigrew, who was responsible for giving Voldemort his resurrection and had personally "killed the spare" leaving the Diggory family in mourning), treacle tarts, even flashing him once (which had really just caused embarrassment as Neville got an eyeful). Nothing had worked.

"I don't know," Harry said.

"I got a blood test last summer to see if I can get in a Vault," Hermione said, stubbornly keeping the conversation going.

"Me too," Harry agreed.

"Oh? I'm just getting really worried about the whole thing," Hermione said. She glanced over at Neville, Ron and Ginny who were all blinking at her blankly. What war? She turned back to Harry "Did you know that all the wizards and witches I asked didn't know about it? But they're pretty sure they know how to protect themselves. But then I realized they didn't even know what radiation was. I don't want to end up with cancer, or worse, I wouldn't be able to take my OWLs or my NEWTs."

"We'll have to wait and see," Harry replied in a non-committal mutter. Hermione sighed loudly.

"Harry! Can't you see it isn't your fault?" she exclaimed. "You didn't do anything wrong! It's horrible what happened, but it's not your fault. Sure, the adults could have done better, but they shouldn't have put so much on your shoulders. All you can do is stand up and keep walking forward. Keep learning more!"

"She's right, mate," Ron said. "You-Know-Who did this, not you. Don't get down."

"And Fudge is a moron," Ginny put in. "He's scared, and he's a moron. Don't worry, things will get better."

Harry didn't say anything. He just stared off into nothing, just as he had the last few times they'd lost their tempers at his sullen behavior.

* * *

Two weeks later, Hermione was staring at the plastic card in her hands. In bright red UK-13 stood out on the pale sea green of the ticket. Under the large lettering was her picture, her birth date, place of residence and family. On the back was a strange bar code: a series of lines printed in royal blue under the Union Jack.

"We've got different tickets," She said sadly, glancing at the tears barely held back in her parents' eyes.

"I know," Helen, Hermione's mother said, holding her daughter close. "But at least this way we know you're safe."

"But-" Hermione's mind started to race in mid-protest. Everything she thought about the future was changing, so different from what she thought would happen. It had been so easy a few years ago, back before the war really started to ramp up. She had seen herself going to Hogwarts and becoming the best witch she possibly could. Now her entire future was in flux, with nothing certain.

Thoughts ran through her mind. She had considered the possibilities, but hadn't believed it would be so soon. She always thought she would have more time; time to finish school; time to learn a trade; time to marry and have a family. But she didn't have the time. It was happening now.

On one level, she knew what to expect of the Vault. It was a protective structure built deep underground to house and protect humanity so that their descendants could return to the surface when it was safe. But now, when it was time to prepare for it to happen, Hermione realized she didn't have enough of anything to supply herself or her family. And the fact that she wasn't going to be with her parents scared her more than ever.

It was hard enough only seeing them a couple of months a year. She and her parents agreed it was the great failing of all boarding schools, magical or not. She knew that it pained them to have to see her grow and change so much in the months between visit. Then she went to spend time with her magical friends, making the family time less and less. Now it would end all together.

And then there was the fact that she might very well have children of her own someday. She, like many young women, knew motherhood was likely in the future. But she realized that with her being a witch, there was a very likely possibility of them being magical as well. For them there would be no wands, no spellbooks, no Hogwarts. The Ministry of Magic would be unavailable to clear up accidental magics and there was no telling how the other vault dwellers would react.

"Hermione, we'll go to the informational meeting at the London Vault-Tech office and make a decision as a family," her father said. "While I know you like Hogwarts, this might be the safest method for you and for us. But lets get all the information before we decide to join or not."

"Okay," Hermione said even as thoughts of what generations of witches and wizards would need. The list was compiling in her head. Wands, books, potions sets, materials, plants. It wouldn't have a physical form or a concrete collection for some time, but it was building all the same.

* * *

"Now listen here, Boy!" Vernon said, getting right into Harry's face. "We're going to Vault-Tech London and you are going to do exactly as they say, do you hear me boy? We've got our tickets and you damn well better not screw this up for us!"

"Yes, Uncle Vernon," Harry said robotically. He was already prepared: wand and invisibility cloak in his pockets, Hedwig already uncaged and ready to fly away at a moment's notice. Harry stood up and walked to the car, buckling himself into the back seat behind Vernon. Dudley always took the seat behind Petunia since he needed more room. Harry glanced back at the doorway to where his aunt was sobbing over his obese cousin.

"Oh, Dudders," Petunia sobbed. She pulled her unhealthy son into an embrace. "I can't believe we didn't get the same vault. I want you to promise me to be a good boy in the vault, just like you are for me."

"Yes, Mum," Dudley said like he always did. Harry barely suppressed a snort of disbelief. She was acting like this, and it wasn't like Vault Day was right around the corner.

"Don't worry Pet," Vernon said warmly. "Dudders' a man now. Big and strong. He'll survive without us."

"I know, I'm just going to miss you so much," she said still clinging to Dudley (who was looking more and more embarrassed by the minute).

"We've still got two months before sealing day, Pet," Vernon reminded. "We'll go on a nice vacation beforehand. Maybe even to Calais like you always wanted. Just the three of us."

"What about the Freak?" Dudley asked.

"Oh, we'll find some place for him," Vernon said dismissively as he guided his wife and son to the hovercar. Harry sighed as he noticed it dip low as Vernon and Dudley climbed in.

* * *

Vault-Tech London was huge. Built like a giant pyramid, it was designed to have the same basic appearance as an uncovered vault. Constructed on former farmland about ten years before, it wasn't actually in London, but about 40 minutes drive north of the city. And today, it was packed.

The lines were huge with ever parking space filled and people waiting outside in the hot sun under beach umbrellas for shade. Every so often a woman in a blue dress suit and a Mr. Orderly unit would pass out water bottles to those waiting in line. Harry looked over at Vernon and Dudley, who were both soaked with sweat. Vernon had made the poor choice of wearing his best suit, thinking they could just waltz right into the offices and get the information.

Instead there were groups of a hundred at a time. The Vault-Tech greeter robots, Securitrons Harry thought they were called, counted off the number and let them inside. A while later, they'd exit with a folder and smiles on their faces. As the hours passed, Harry and the Dursley's got closer and closer to the front. The Securitrons counted off a hundred, ending with Petunia.

"Move along," the robots told the Dursleys.

"I'm with them," Harry said, pointing to the vanishing family.

"100 capacity at a time," the electronic voice replied. "No exceptions."

"Okay," Harry said with a resigned sigh.

* * *

Time passed easier, since he was now in the cool shade of the entryway, and he eventually made it inside. The room was wide and long, though narrow and had a projector behind them shining the image of a vault on a wall at the far end of the room. In front of the vault was a cartoon of a blond boy giving a wink and a thumbs up to the viewer. Harry dithered a bit as he pondered where to sit.

"Harry?" a familiar voice asked form behind him. The boy turned to see an unexpected face.

"Hermione?" Harry asked in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

She held up her ticket. "My ticket, UK-13."

Harry managed a grin and held up his own. "Same."

Hermione almost jumped over and pulled him into a hug which he returned just as heartily. "Harry, these are my parents, Helen and Menelaus. Mum, Dad, this is Harry Potter."

Hermione's father, Menelaus, reached out and shook Harry's hand. "I didn't know Hermione was going to have any classmates here."

"It was a surprise to me as well," Harry admitted. "I'm just here because my relatives got tickets as well and they'd be rejected if I refused."

"Oh, I thought there'd be no one I knew in the Vault," Hermione said. "I wonder what we're going to find out."

"Most of the people I saw leaving had folders," Harry said. "Other than that, I don't know."

Hermione opened her mouth to reply, but a loud voice from the stage cut her off.

"Everyone, if you would just take your seats, please?" a man said through a microphone. "We'd like to get started right away."

There was a small flurry of activity as people scrambled to their seats. The room darkened and some cheery music started up.

"Hello future vault dwellers!" said a cheerful woman's voice. "Welcome to the Vault-Tech United Kingdom informational where we're proud to present to you the virtual tour of our facilities that you'll be enjoying soon."

The images changed to show Vault Boy bowing and motioning for the viewers to "walk" into the video's vault door.

"Each vault is a state of the art construction planned to help protect and preserve the British spirit into the future," the woman's voice continued as it showed men, women and children enter a vault with expressions of amazement on their faces. The scenes changed as it showed them living life in a vault with all the modern services and conveniences. The image changed to show Vault Boy dressed up like a Buckingham Palace guard giving a wink and a thumbs up. "The future of Britain depends on you!"

"Enjoy our state of the art entertainment and education facilities as you use your learned skills to propel your vault into the future," she said as scenes of underground pools, school rooms and computer labs superimposed over a Union Jack. "We at Vault-Tech international are glad to have you working with us. We're dedicated to serving you and Britain now and forever. Now, please take an informational packet from the chair in front of you."

The video changed to show Vault Boy and Vault Girl opening up the packets and looking on in amazement.

"I know you are all looking forward to doing your best for Britain, but because of safety, we have to have certain rules in place," the woman's voice said. "for your safety and ours, we must enforce that everyone take only five personal items into the vault. While all essentials are supplied for our Dwellers, we have limited space and resources and want to make sure everything is as healthy as possible. With this in mind, we ask that no chems, no pets and no unauthorized plants be brought into the Vaults. Clothing will be provided upon entry, so note that each article of clothing counts as one of your personal items. We recommend your favorite holonovels, bits of family history or other items of nostalgia so you can remember those you left behind."

"Only five?" a man demanded in front of Harry and the Grangers. "This is a scam! Why not let us take a suitcase?"

Unfortunately for him the video continued on without him.

"Please remember that any rules or restrictions we put in place are because we're only concerned about your safety," the narrator said. "After all, saving the human race is our business."

The video changed again, showing Vault Boy and Vault Girl marching happily hand in hand into the vault. As soon as they were inside, the vault door rolled closed. The video over, the lights came on and the music ended.

"Thank you for joining us," the woman's voice said. "Please follow the Securitrons to our medical facility where we will make sure we have a full record of your health. Because forewarned is forearmed!"

* * *

Ted Tonks wasn't really sure why he and his family were there. They were a wizard and two witches, after all. This whole vault thing could easily be something of a muggle scam, but it wasn't up to him. The muggle authorities had caught him out walking the crup one day and asked why he hadn't registered with the local medical center. His protests ignored, he'd been given a week to register his whole household or the next time they saw him he'd be arrested. While he could have easily escaped with magic, he didn't really want to make waves in the neighborhood.

With that in mind, Ted, Andromeda and their grown daughter Nymphadora had gone to the local clinic for testing. It had taken a bit of wrangling, since neither Andromeda nor Nymphadora existed on paper, having been born in the Wizarding World, but he wasn't about to dodge the cops for the rest of his life.

"Why should we be concerned about this muggle war?" Andromeda asked, not for the first, second or third time.

"Because muggles fight differently from witches and wizards," Ted explained as they made their way to the Vault-Tech medical facilities. "They do everything bigger. They've got bombs that can destroy entire cities. Hiding just means they don't know they killed us all. And well, I'd like to be able to walk the crup without being accosted by madwomen with white feathers and lunatic bobbies with an axe to grind."

"I still don't know how that could be true," Andy replied. "I'd think if the muggles destroyed a city, we'd know about it."

"We do," Ted said, repeating the same argument they'd been having since the vault issue came about. "This isn't new, honey. They've had these bombs for about a hundred and twenty years. Two were dropped on Japanese cities in the 1940s."

"Cities?"

"One for each, dear."

"They can't be that big a deal if they've only used them a couple of times," Andy stated with utter certainty. Ted rolled his eyes and made a counter argument. It had become a bit of a game. Pureblood princess that she was, Andy had changed since her first bit of rebellion by dating Ted, but there was still some lingering prejudice against muggles and their technology. It had been troubling when he brought her to see his parents' house. Nymphadora was better, taking more after him in personality and more like her mother in magic, but even she was doubtful about the vault issue.

"Wait," Andy said, stopping sharply. "Is that who I think it is?"

Ted and Nymphadora turned. Walking with an older couple and a girl about his age was a familiar mop of hair with a scar in the shape of a lightning bolt.

"Merlin's bloody balls," Nymphadora muttered darkly under her breath.

"What in blue blazes is the Boy-Who-Lived doing in this meeting?" Andromeda asked in confusion.

"Those aren't his relatives, either," Nymphadora pointed out.

"How do you know that?" Ted inquired of his daughter. She sighed and slumped a little. He could tell she was struggling to keep her hair from changing in public, something that always caused her a bit of stress.

"I've been keeping an eye on him sometimes for Professor Dumbledore," she admitted.

"Oh, you're not getting pulled into that damn bird club of his, are you?" her mother asked with a bit of derision tinging her voice. "I'd really prefer it if you didn't charm a glowing target on your chest."

"Too late, Mum, I'm in the bird club," Nymphadora answered.

"Ugh, bad enough my sisters and cousins lose everything for joining up with that monster, now my daughter's going to get herself killed fighting it," Andy grumbled.

"You do know that Sirius is innocent, right?" her daughter pointed out.

"All I know is that war got my sister Bellatrix sent to Azkaban, my cousin Sirius sent to Azkaban, my cousin Regulus sent to hell by the snake's wand, and my sister Narcissa sent to hell on earth by being forced to marry another monster who _should_ have been sent to Azkaban. Honestly, mother and Auntie sold her off like cattle to auction," Andy told her daughter in exasperation. "I know what I'm talking about. I know exactly what that monster has cost my family. Your great-aunt might have burned me off the tapestry for having a brain to think with, but they're still my family. Yours too, Nymphadora."

"Ugh, Walpurga," Nymphadora grumbled. "Nasty wench." At her mother's curious eyebrow raise, the young woman shrugged. "Met the painting. Horrible woman."

"That, my dear daughter, is a grand understatement, I don't believe that a painting, even animated and possessing an impression of her personality, could truly portray her as she was in life," Andy commented. "Very well, let's get this 'physical' over and done with."

Ted grinned as his wife went into her "oh, it's such an imposition, but as a pureblood princess I must practice _noblesse oblige_" mode. Everything about her being screamed "feel pleased I'm deigning to do this, you should feel proud to be allowed in my presence." Much more put on than when they first started dating, these days she used it more like a joke. Ted, however, always thought the attitude sparked other feelings. Maybe it was a good idea for Nymphadora to spend the night out on the town tonight.

* * *

"You've got to be kidding me," Tracy Davis said, gawking and glaring at the boy at the head of the line. She shook her head of long blonde hair and looked again, getting the same result. Her suspicions confirmed, she straightened her back and grew just slightly more tense. Her mother held the baby Davis to her chest and followed her daughter's gaze.

"What do you mean?" her father asked. Elijah Davis, like James Potter, was a pureblood who married a muggleborn, Mary Travers. It was a supreme irony that their daughter went into Slytherin considering her Half-Blood status, a situation that was inevitably troublesome, and the fact that her mother and father were a Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff respectively.

"Don't you recognize him?" Tracy said, pointing towards the boy. "Please tell me you know who I'm talking about."

"No, my dear," her mother said, "I'm afraid that you'll have to explain."

"That boy up there?" Tracy said, nodding towards the thin teen up ahead. Her parents took a closer look. "That's Harry Potter."

"You cannot be serious? The Boy-Who-Lived, regardless of what the Prophet says, wouldn't be here of all places," her father protested.

"That's him," Tracy said. "I probably would have dismissed him as a look-a-like if he wasn't walking with Granger. That's a head of hair I couldn't possibly mistake. Those two and Weasley act like they're Hogwarts Royalty when they're at the castle, but he's probably here because of his muggle relatives."

"I know Dumbledore said he was safe, but placed with muggles? That's stretching things a bit, wouldn't you say?" her father said, skepticism heavy in his voice.

"Oh, I know what the rumors say and I know what the other Slytherin parents say, but I keep my ears open at Hogwarts," Tracy replied. "What was it you always say? 'All knowledge is priceless in the right context?' Was that it?"

"Yes, but really, muggles?" Elijah asked.

"Might I remind you, dears," Mary said tersely, "that both your in-laws, and your grandparents, Tracy, are muggles? You know, those two wonderful people who raised me?"

"Well, I'm sure it's perfectly acceptable for him to have a well rounded background full of diversity and experience," Tracy's father said quickly without any trace of nervousness. Of course, if he weren't nervous, he wouldn't have agreed to Mary's insinuations so to save face he instead changed the topic slightly. "What do you think of this war? Could it really affect us?"

Just like Andromeda Tonks before him, he didn't have the knowledge needed to truly understand what the muggles were afraid of. Magical ignorance struck again. Tracy's mother was quick to shush her husband, chastising him for his poor education.

"Very well," her father agreed. "I suppose if Albus Dumbledore has Potter attending I should take this seriously. I don't know about all that nonsense about You-Know-Who, but Albus Dumbledore has done well by the Wizarding World for a long time so I'm not just going to jump ship at the first opportunity."

"Such a Hufflepuff, Dear, such a Hufflepuff," Mary said warmly to her husband. "Though it does hurt a bit that you didn't take my word for it."

"I did, but as you always said in Hogwarts: always back up your evidence with more evidence," he replied. His wife shook her head with a bemused smile as she repositioned herself and her sleeping baby.

"I'm worried about Astoria," Tracy blurted out. "And Daphne," she added quickly.

"What's this?"

Tracy looked up at her parents. "Daphne's like you, Dad. She doesn't know what's coming. And the muggles only found us because of Mum," Tracy explained. "She's my best friend. I'm not going to leave her alone in Slytherin on the off chance that Potter's right about You-Know-Who. The Malfoy block will eat her alive if she doesn't have an outlet."

"Very well, we'll look into it when we get all the information, not before," Mary agreed as they were summoned into the medlab.

* * *

"You have got to be kidding me," Harry said as he stood in the nearly empty parking lot.

"Harry?" Hermione asked. "Where are your relatives waiting?"

Harry glanced over the lot once more trying to find their distinctive figures in the few remaining people. It really wouldn't have been that hard to find people who closely resembled two human-hippo hybrids and a human-horse-giraffe hybrid, but that was assuming they'd wait around for him.

"They ditched me?" Harry asked. "I can't believe they ditched me!"

"Harry, you're in Surrey, right?" Menelaus, Hermione's father asked. Harry nodded. The man smiled warmly to him. "What town? We can give you a ride."

"Little Whinging. I don't want to impose," Harry began.

"Harry, get in the car," Hermione commanded, her hands on her hips, her face stern and her voice filled with her powerful bossy nature.

"Yes, Hermione," he said as he accompanied the Grangers to their car. And what a nice car it was. Newer, faster, sleeker, the Grangers' Maserati hovercar was beautiful. Dentistry, even in the age of the Auto-Doc, paid well apparently.

Riding with the Grangers was different from family interactions he'd seen before. It lacked the doting and vitriol that the Dursley's sent Dudley and him respectively. It lacked the Weasley's strange diversity of opinion, barely constrained chaos and loud voices as well. The Grangers treated Hermione, and him by extension, as little adults, not as children. It was refreshing. In the time it took them to get to Little Whinging, they spoke of politics, how the war effected their practice and something of Hermione's latest reads.

"Here it is," Harry said, as they pulled up to the curb in front of 4 Privet Drive. Harry got out, walked up to the house, absently noting that Vernon's cherry red BMW 5 hovercar was missing. He reached the door, pulled and realized it was locked. He tried again, pressing his hand against the lock, twisting and turning.

"What's the matter?" Helen Granger asked.

"It's locked," he replied. Hermione's father turned off the engine. Together, he and Harry peeked in windows. "They're not home." He slumped against the door. "They went on vacation and ditched me."

"I'm really starting to dislike your relatives, Harry," Menelaus Granger said. "Is there any other way for you to get in?"

"My window upstairs," Harry explained. "I opened it to allow Hedwig to fly. If you give me a lift I can climb in."

"I can do that but only if you promise to pack your things and come with us," Mr. Granger said. "Hermione told me what happened this year, all that idiocy with the cup and what happened to your friend. You're not staying alone."

"That's not necessary," Harry protested. "I'll be fine."

"That's a lie and you know it," Mr. Granger said, telling Harry more than anything exactly how Hermione got her Bossy streak. He threaded his fingers and leaned down so Harry could use the lift. "Up you go."

Harry clamored up the shingles, the gravel and tar scratching his palms as he braced himself. Maneuvering around the lower level, Harry managed to reach his open window. With a jump and a bit of luck, he manged to half throw himself inside, though the sill hit him right in the diaphragm, knocking the wind out of him.

As was usual for him, Harry did as he was told. He packed everything from his school books to Hedwig to his personal belongings. He made his way down stairs, Hedwig's cage in one hand, his trunk dragging along behind him in the other and made it to the front door. Taped to the handle was a note.

"Boy," the note read in Petunia's familiar hand. "We've gone on vacation. Don't cause trouble and no freakishness. The box on the table is yours."

Harry glanced at the table and saw an enameled box about half the size of his trunk sitting on the kitchen table. He shrugged and opened the door.

"This is, Harry?" Mr. Granger asked.

"Almost," Harry said, nodding to the box. Mr. Granger nodded and picked up the trunk. Harry grabbed the box. After some rearranging of the boot, they managed to have room enough for everything with Hedwig's cage between the two teens in the back seat. They turned the key and the hovercar lifted up off the ground, gone from Little Whinging a few minutes later.

* * *

"Wotcha, Prof," Tonks said as she entered the Order's current headquarters. Most of the other were parked around the kitchen table as they usually were before kicking the children out for a meeting.

"Hello, Nymphadora," Dumbledore said. "I must admit, I wasn't expecting you here today. Family business, I think you said."

"Yeah," she nodded. "But I saw Harry Potter at the Vault-Tech meeting earlier."

"What?" Molly Weasley gasped out. "He's supposed to be safe with his relatives!"

"I think they were in the earlier group," Tonks explained. Sirius raised a hand.

"For the rest of us, what's Volt-tick?"

"Vault Technologies," Tonks corrected. "Muggles are worried about war and are building underground bunkers to keep people safe. My family business was an informational at Vault-Tech. My dad got caught by the muggle aurors and told he needed to sign up the whole family. We all got tickets, so we had to go find out more according to the muggle laws."

"And you say Harry got a ticket for such a place?" Dumbledore asked.

"He wouldn't have been there if he didn't have a ticket, probably got signed up along with his relatives," Tonks explained.

"Muggles are at war?" Arthur Weasley asked. Tonks struggled to keep from rolling her eyes and sighing. She failed partially and let out a deep sigh. She went on to explain everything and it ended up being a repeat of her parents' debates on the subject.

"This vault might actually be the safest place for Harry right now," Dumbledore said, popping a new Lemon Sherbert Drop. A number of the purebloods of the Order looked at him like he was mad. "With Fawkes, we can retrieve him at any time, but so long as he's in this Vault, which I'm assuming is like a muggle version of Gringott's, he's safe from outside threats. So long as the location is kept secret from Voldemort's forces, Harry will be safer than ever before."

"What should I do?" Tonks asked. "I mean, my whole family got tickets and we're not sure what we're choosing."

"I'd ask you to take the chance, Nymphadora," Dumbledore suggested. "You'll be closer, more able to protect him and we can still call you back with Fawkes. It's safest this way, I think."

"I don't like the idea of Harry being trapped like that," Sirius protested. "He should be here, with us. We can protect him better than anyone else can."

"Padfoot," Lupin said, resting a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Think about it this way. With him in hiding, we don't have to spend so much energy protecting him. We can bring the fight to You-Know-Who. We can be proactive instead of defensive. But to keep in touch, have Tonks give him a Mirror."

"Mirror?" Dumbledore asked. The two Marauders chuckled a bit.

"Communication mirrors," Remus explained. "Say the name of the person with the other mirror and their image appears. You can talk to each other through them. James and I made them so we could talk to each other when we were in separate detentions."

"Hey! I helped too!" Sirius protested.

"Hmm... I always did wonder how you three could meet up so quickly after you were released," Dumbledore pondered. "Can you still make them?"

"With the resources, sure," Remus said, looking to Sirius who nodded. "I'll need someone else to deal with the silver, but I can do most of the Charms work. It was my array and calculations that made them possible."

"Have Filius work with you," Dumbledore said. "I want all of us to have a Mirror. Sirius, Remus, make a list of other Marauder inventions. I have a feeling they may come in handy in the future."

"I don't think this is right," Molly protested. "He's just a child. Harry should be here with us. If he's here, we don't need guards or anyone at Privet Drive."

"No, Molly," Dumbledore said. "For all the reasons we've said here and more. While Harry's friendship with Ronald and your family is well known, having him closer would put all of you at risk, much greater than you are now. With the mirrors, you'll be able to talk to him."

"What about the prophesy?" Arthur asked. "We've been guarding it all this time and we both know only two people can touch it safely."

"Harry and Voldemort," Dumbledore said. "Yes, we shall have to do something about that. Remus' comment about being more proactive comes to mind. I think the best decision would be to destroy it."

"What?"

"I have a copy," Dumbledore said. "There's no need for the orb. With Harry safe and secluded, we need to limit the possible targets. Perhaps replace it with a fake."

"Why didn't we do this in the first place?" Bill Weasley asked.

"Because I didn't think of it before," Dumbledore replied honestly.

"Oh. Well, okay," Billy said, feeling a bit sheepish.

"Yes, something we probably should have considered much earlier," Dumbledore commented. "Things are looking up, I suppose. Next we just need Voldemort to show himself."

* * *

It was late in the day. Almost time for closing in fact. The majority of potential Vault Dwellers were processed and gone by that point and the human staff were just about ready to close up shop.

Then he appeared.

It wasn't that he drove up or took the last bus. He appeared on the cameras out of thin air, only a slight burst of wind as he appeared.

Seemingly unaffected by the sweltering heat in his black pinstripe suit, black fedora, black shirt and white tie, he walked up to the Securitrons and handed them a ticket for Vault UK-13.

* * *

.

.

.


	3. Chapter 3

Readers might want to head back a chapter. It has significantly changed, seeing as I forgot two scenes when I was posting. Both are there now.

* * *

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter 3**

* * *

"So, you're resigning because of this _muggle_ war?" Rufus Scrimgeor asked incredulously. On the other side of his desk, Tonks squirmed slightly under his disbelieving stare. "Are you mad? There's no need to worry about some idiot muggles killing each other. We're perfectly hidden and safe."

"Sir, it was a family decision," Tonks replied. "If there's no bomb, we just apparate right out later on."

"So you're really looking for extended leave without pay?" he asked, leaning back in his chair. "The without pay is the easy part, the hard part is being allowed to return later."

"I thought it would be sir," she replied formally. The Head Auror grumbled wordlessly, rifled around in his desk and pulled out a piece of parchment. He scribbled something on it before passing it to her.

"Here's my recommendation," Scrimgeor said. "I don't want to lose you. You're damn good at what you do, and your metamorphic talents are very valuable. Moody even says you've got a lot of potential for Constant Vigilance, which for him is glowing praise. If this is what it takes to get you back here, that's what I'll do. Go, take that to Bones. She'll need to sign off on the leave."

"Thank you sir."

Tonks turned and left, quickly navigating the twisting, turning tunnels and corridors of the Ministry of Magic. The layout was anything but logical, with Departments, Offices and sections having been built by expanding charms as they were needed, rather than planned out. While the Aurors were stationed on the east side of the Ministry, the office of the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement was on the very reaches of the western most Ministry tunnels. Anyone wanting to pass between the two had to either floo to the entryway and fight through the crowds or navigate through the maze and fight through the crowds. Tonks preferred to walk so she didn't fly flat on her face when presenting her request for extended leave, something that seemed to always happen when she used the floo to the DMLE.

After nearly an hour's walk, Tonks arrived at the office of Amelia Bones.

"Come in," the woman called through the door at Tonks' knock. The metamorphic witch opened the door and stepped inside. She handed the woman the parchment.

"Extended leave for family reasons?" Bones asked after inspecting the paperwork for a moment. She tossed it on the desk and crossed her arms, half-glaring at the younger woman. "I'm going to be blunt about this. Are you pregnant?"

"No, but looking at it, I could understand why that might be a common assumption," Tonks replied.

"It's the most common reason I get these requests. Those are almost always granted and almost never end. The vast majority of young mother aurors choose to keep the mother and drop the auror. Very few come back. For Scrimgeor to give a recommendation, it means something," Bones commented, glancing at her subordinate's signature on the bottom of the page. The woman stood up, cranked on the Wizarding Wireless to a slightly louder than comfortable level and sat back down. "We can talk privately now. So what is the real reason you're requesting leave?"

Tonks explained, again, about the muggle war. She was getting aggravated about having to repeat the same facts over and over again for each person she met. Tonks was starting to understand why her muggleborn friends got so aggravated with magic raised friends some times.

"So, your family is going to spend time in the vault to wait out the war," Bones asked. "These bombs... I've read reports. There's a lot of history in the DMLE that never made it into Binn's lectures. Most people don't know that London, including Diagon Alley, had to be rebuilt in the 1940s and 1950s after the Germans bombed England. Are these bombs the kind that we can just go to another part of Britain to avoid?"

"No," Tonks replied flatly. "I don't really know the specifics myself, but Dad says these bombs carry someone called Radish-Anne, or someone like that. And she can-"

"You can stop the stupid pureblood act right now, auror, because I'm not buying it," Bones snapped.

"It's an invisible gas, I guess," Tonks summed up as well as she could, "that kills people who aren't even the targets of the bombs."

"Have you tried to make a report on this? People should know about the danger," Bones said. Tonks sighed as she rolled her shoulder to get a kink out. Her hair turned black to gray (pure gray, not the usual salt-and-pepper kind of gray), to the same green-black as the walls back to her usual pink as she sorted out her answer.

"I did think about it," Tonks admitted, "but decided not to when I saw what Fudge did to Harry Potter and Dumbledore. I'd lose my job or worse and just as many people would be dead in the end."

"Unfortunately I agree," Amelia Bones said. "These Vaults, how are they selecting people?"

"I'm not sure of the exact selection process, but blood tests, medical scans, and I think a lottery," Tonks explained. She pulled the informational folder from the inside of her coat and passed it to the older woman. "We're limited to five personal items. No animals or plants. Clothes count as personal items."

"Well, to be quite frank the muggles don't know that we know how to cheat," Amelia said. "Which is why we are going to cheat, cheat, cheat, cheat."

"What? _We_?" Tonks asked, her eyebrows reaching for the sky in surprise.

"There are a huge number of people out there that are going to die if these bombs fall," Bones explained. "You know it, I know it. Plus, if Dumbledore and Potter are right, Voldemort is back. Which means even more people will die. I remember Death Eater tactics from the last war. They manipulate people and populations using money, isolating or ruining opposition. They target families of those who resist. They don't have problems murdering children in the most horrific ways."

"And if the bombs fall, even if Dumbledore and Potter are wrong, we still have massive numbers of people dead or dieing," Tonks put in, though she fully believed in Dumbledore and by extension, Potter.

"Exactly. I want to smuggle some children of certain ministry officials into these vaults," Bones said, the Wizarding wireless still blasting in the background. "Susan is going into her 5th year. Rumor has it, that monster of an undersecretary is being appointed as a professor over Dumbledore's head. That puts pressure on me and almost anyone else with children there."

"I know some people who are good with making things," Tonks replied, thinking back to Sirius and Remus's list of inventions. "Maybe something like a locket that can be enlarged enough to walk into, like the trunk Moody was found in this spring."

"Good thinking," Bones replied. "Supplies, important files. It will also allow you to not be limited by the Vault rules."

"They do claim to have good reasons for the rules, but with magic, we can change the situations easily enough," Tonks agreed. "My mum will be glad to be allowed to bring everything. She was trying to narrow it down to five, but the pile still takes up the entire living room table."

"And remember, it's not like they're going to kick you out once the door's shut," Bones told her. She held up the leave request. "I'm going to sign this. If anyone asks, you're pregnant and proud as punch."

"I can fake it too," Tonks said, making her belly swell as if nearly to term.

"I didn't think of that, but it works in our favor," Bones agreed. "Do you object to the potential fallout of being seen as a single mother?"

"It's fake and I won't be here long, so I doubt it will matter," Tonks replied.

"Come up with ideas and we'll plan," Bones said. "When are the Vaults scheduled to close?"

"Late summer," Tonks replied. "So, two months, give or take."

"Should be enough time," Amelia said. "Next time, though, we'll meet at my house."

"Thank you, Director," Tonks said as the other woman turned down the radio.

"Good luck."

* * *

"But I need that because Tomad's Guide to Advanced Arithmancy doesn't make sense without the Tobias compendium, and I of course need all my spell books. Oh and can't forget my wand. Number one on my list," Hermione said, not for the first time and not for the last. It had been three days since Harry arrived and the Granger household was frantic. Or at least Hermione was and to a lesser extent, Harry. Well, Harry was really just concerned about what would happen to Hedwig and his friends from school. Hermione was finding it impossible to narrow her list down to five items.

For the past hour, Harry had sat on Hermione's bed as the girl had a panic attack over the Vault-Tech informational.

"Hermione, put the list down and come to dinner," Menelaus called. Hermione, still muttering about what to bring, never heard her father's voice. Harry stood up, gently grabbed his friend by the shoulders and aimed the pacing girl towards the hallway. Hermione barely noticed where they were going until they arrived in the dining room with a full spread on the table.

"Hermione," Helen said sternly. "Put the list down and come eat."

Reluctantly, very reluctantly, Hermione put the list down and sat at the table. The four of them ate without speaking, since any conversation they'd had in the last two days had been co-opted by Hermione's List.

When Hermione's mother finally wiped her lips with the napkin and set it down, only then did conversation resume.

"Now, Hermione. You are not allowed your list or to make a new one for two days," Helen stated. Hermione opened her mouth to argue, but both parents held up hands to cut her off. "No, you listen. You are making this much more stressful than it really needs to be. First of all, scan all your books onto a holotape. Then all of them count as one item."

Hermione glanced down at her list. That one solution shrunk the list by about 85%.

"Now you only need to worry about the other four," Menelaus said.

"Three, I'm taking my wand," Hermione said. "But that's going to make it even harder. On the other hand, if I'm going to scan the books to holotape, that means I need more books."

The two elder Grangers sighed and shared a look.

Harry got the impression that "need more books" for Hermione was a lot like "Need more Vespine Gas" for Protoss.

"What do you say the two of you go to Diagon Alley tomorrow?" Menelaus Granger suggested. "Get out of the house, spend some time in London."

"That sounds good to me," Harry agreed.

"Great," he said. "You and Hermione can take a bus."

* * *

There were many reasons why heading to Diagon Alley might have been a bad idea for Harry. Of course, he wasn't aware of what they'd been printing in the Prophet, and he was so preoccupied by other things (since the Grangers had, between the three of them, successfully derailed his fixation on Cedric's death for the time being) that he didn't even think of the possible danger. As soon as the two teens entered the Leaky Cauldron they could almost feel an oppressive aura clinging to everyone. Their eyes followed Harry, and because she was with him, Hermione as well. These weren't the "oh Merlin, it's Harry Potter" eye he had felt before. These were the same kind of eyes he felt in second year when everyone thought he was the Heir of Slytherin.

"What is going on?" Harry asked aloud. He wasn't sure if he was asking himself, Hermione, the bar keep, Tom or the people staring at him.

"You'd best move along Mr. Potter," Tom said as his eyes flicked nervously between the crowd and the teens. He nodded towards the brick wall. "Go ahead."

Hermione gave the crowd a disapproving look. Her lips thinned, her eyes became steely and she tried her best to give the same presence Minerva McGonagall had impressed on so many. More than a few flinched. Hermione allowed herself a superior smirk before turning and marching out the open door to Diagon Alley.

The stares followed them there too, but Harry staunchly ignored them. He held his head high and walked forward. Unbeknownst to him, the very fact that he was walking through the Alley without reacting started to change opinions of him.

Most people in the Wizarding world had never met, nor even laid eyes on Harry Potter. They got all their news from the Prophet or the Wizarding Wireless. They had only seen the side of Harry that the press had wanted them to see. But here he was, unafraid, head held high walking with purpose through the cobbled street. So many of them tried and failed to reconcile the descriptions of an attention whore the Prophet and Ministry portrayed and the young man before them. Here, standing tall before them, he seemed noble, possessed of a higher purpose. Of course that illusion would have been shattered if they known Harry was just trying to ignore them, but they didn't.

Together, Hermione and Harry walked from store window to store window, looking at things here and there as they made their way to Gringott's to change some money. They didn't notice three wizards see the young man and apparate away to their master. They didn't see the members of the Order see him walking down the alley in broad daylight and start in shock. Not that either teen had any clue about the Order of the Phoenix.

They entered the goblin bank and Hermione changed some pounds to galleons.

"Will you be needing anything?" the goblin demanded of Harry.

"Um, I guess I should get some spending money," he admitted.

"Very well, Mr. Potter," the teller said before motioning towards a familiar door. "Please wait by the door and someone will be there to take you to your vault."

"Okay," Harry said. "Can Hermione come?"

"Who you let into your vault is your own business," the goblin replied. "If she steals from you when you let her in, it's your fault."

"Hermione won't steal from me," he replied just a bit tersely. The goblin seemed to grin cruelly at the boy's innocence, but ignored him as soon as Harry started towards the door to the bank-vaults. As the goblin led them down, Hermione watched as the cart rushed passed vault after vault. She'd never been to the vaults before, and this was quite a new experience. The goblin allowed Harry to open his vault and Hermione gasped at the glittering coins that seemed to decorate every corner in piles like waves on a metallic sea.

"Harry, you're rich," she gasped.

"I guess," he said noncommittally. He turned to the goblin. "How much do I have in here?"

"How should I know? It's not like goblins actually count your money, we just maintain the vaults," the creature snarled back. "What do I look like? A slide rule?"

"You run a bank but you don't count the money?" Hermione asked. "How does that even work?"

"You humans getting your coins or are you just wasting my time?" the goblin snarled. Hermione huffed in preparation for a sharply worded response, but Harry cut him off.

"Give me a moment to fill up," he said, scooping a bunch of coins into a bag. He packed it as full as he could and still be able to carry it easily. He tied the mouth shut and hefted it up. Gold, even magical gold, was heavy. It was not a large bag but felt like he was trying to benchpress Dudley.

"How much did you get?" Hermione asked.

"I dunno, I didn't count it," he replied as they got back into the cart. It wasn't long before they were at the surface. They stepped out of the bank and had the most unpleasant experience of the day.

"Well, well, if it isn't Potty and the Mudblood," a smiling Draco Malfoy said. He was flanked by Crabbe and Goyle the youngers, Nott and Flint, who had graduated a while back. They weren't even being subtle about blocking the pathway.

"Hermione, did you hear a strange squeaking sound?" Harry asked. "I'm sure I heard it."

"It was probably that ferret in the road," Hermione replied. "You know how they always are getting in the way. So many die each year in street accidents."

She turned and gave the blond boy a look that promised death. Malfoy sputtered and started to turn pink.

"So, uh," Malfoy enunciated, "uh, yeah! What are you gonna do about it?"

"Hmm..." Harry said. "Can't use my wand because we're not in Hogwarts, not that I think you'd care about a little thing like the law since you're still sucking on daddy's teat and he'd get you out of anything. Hmm... what can I do?"

"How about hitting you over the head with my heavy bag of gold?" Harry pondered as he swung the heavy burden at Malfoy's face. The blond tried to duck, but Harry was too fast and the bag was too heavy. It hit Malfoy right in the jaw, sending him flying to the ground. The other had their wands out and were snarling spells, further proving Harry's hypothesis that Slytherins don't believe the rules apply to them. Harry, however, just ducked down and picked up Malfoy. Stunners and other spells impacted on the insensate blond's back. The three soon-to-be 5th year Slytherins kept casting spells at Harry, who kept his Malfoy Shield up.

Flint, however, had turned his wand on Hermione, who had ducked to the side, her smaller bag of gold clutched to her chest. "Cru-"

The unforgivable spell was cut off after the first syllable as a tall black man with a badge, clamped a hand on Flint's bicep.

"Thank you Flint," the man said as he stunned the young man. "You made this so easy."

Four other quick spells hit the other Slytherins in the back.

"Mr. Potter, Miss Granger," the man said, showing them his DMLE badge. "Why _exactly_ are you brawling in the street?"

"Malfoy and his goons accosted us, Sir," Hermione replied, answering the question he asked, not the question he implied.

"Yes, I was watching the entire time," the man said. He eyed the bag of gold still in Harry's hand. "And it was very stupid of Mr. Malfoy to try to summon a heavy bag of gold out of your hand, Mr. Potter. A very poor choice."

Harry and Hermione glanced at each other as they realized what the man was actually saying.

"Yes," Harry agreed. "Malfoy's stupid like that."

"Well, like father like son," the man commented. "Shacklebolt, Kingsley Shacklebolt."

"Nice to meet you," the two said in unison.

"Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got five young men to take to lock up," the auror said. "While they'll probably slither out of the charges, there's no reason the paperwork has to be filed right away. And things get lost some times."

"Terrible shame," Hermione said.

"Terrible," Harry agreed. "They should work on that sometime."

"When we have a free moment in the DMLE," Kingsley replied.

"Do you ever have a free moment in the DMLE?" Hermione asked.

"Sadly no," the auror said in a voice that suggested it was very much the opposite of "sad." He pulled out a sack and flicked his wand, allowing it to grow many times its size within, but remain the same without. Hermione stared at it in amazement as the auror levitated the unconscious boys into the sack before tucking it into his pocket.

Harry, on the other hand, was looking at the five abandoned wands.

"A shame those boys are so clumsey," he said as he stomped on Malfoy's wand, and was rewarded with a sharp snap.

"A real shame," Kinsley agreed, stomping twice, first on Crabbe's, then on Goyle's wand. Hermione agreed and stomped repeatedly on Nott's wand. Kingsley nodded seriously. "Terrible that only Flint's survived. On a totally unrelated note, did you know that if a spell is interrupted during casting, it still shows up when the wands are checked?"

"I did _not_ know that," Hermione replied innocently. "What an amazing fact. I sure hope that comes in handy some day."

Harry nodded sagely.

"Well, best be off," Kingsley said. "So much paperwork to lose, I mean do."

They watched the auror march off towards the Ministry of Magic singing an innocent song. As soon as he vanished from sight, Hermione grabbed Harry's arm in an iron grip.

"Did you see that bag?" she demanded.

"Bag? What?" Harry asked.

"The bag! The one he put Malfoy and the others in!" she explained.

"Sure, what about it?"

Harry turned and really looked at Hermione. Really, really looked at her. On her face was an expression she had only worn a few times before. It was often a dangerous expression and this case he suspected would be the same. The first time he had ever seen it was in first year. Neville had threatened to tell the professors that they were sneaking out of the common room and Hermione had hit him with a full body bind. The next time he remembered that expression on Hermione's face was when she came up with the idea to brew the polyjuice potion. He'd seen it other times since then with the Sirius/Buckbeak rescue and then a few times last year.

This was an expression Hermione only wore when she was about to break the rules.

Harry swallowed nervously.

"Oh boy."


	4. Chapter 4

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter Four**

* * *

"So you see, it's the perfect solution to my problem!" Hermione finished excitedly outside the bookstore. It had been a flurry of calculations and magical equations mixed with theories and plots. Lists of charms and how they combined most effectively had been thrown out into the pile and discussed in detail. Well, perhaps "discussed" was not the proper term as it usually takes more than one to discuss something and Harry was not an active participant.

Harry, himself, had little swirlies in his eyes as he tried to take it all in. It was kind of like getting a concussion without physical head trauma.

"What do you think?" she asked him. Harry snapped out of his trance.

"I think you need to do what you think is the best solution," he said diplomatically, as usual not quite clear on what he was agreeing to. She pulled him into a hug that almost broke his ribs. He was quite sure that he heard at least two of them squeak under the pressure.

"I knew you'd agree!" she said, practically glowing with excitement. "Now I only need to get supplies!"

She opened the door and rushed inside the bookstore so fast Harry swore he saw an afterimage.

Harry chose to follow at a more sedate pace.

By the time he found her, she had already piled a large stack on the front counter. Judging by the sales clerk's face, she was as befuddled by Hermione's plan as he was. He waved to the blonde girl a few years older than him.

"Hi," he said.

"Hi, Harry," she replied.

"I feel like I should know you," he said.

"You should," she replied. "I was Head Girl your third year."

"Penelope Clearwater?" Harry asked, looking at her again. Her formerly long hair was trimmed into a pixie cut and she looked very different outside of her school robes.

"That's me," she agreed.

"What are you doing as a sales clerk if you were Head Girl?" Harry asked. She paused half way in the act of opening her mouth. She closed it again. There was a look of pain that flashed across her face.

"Oh, um..." Harry prevaricated as he attempted to find something to say.

"I'm muggleborn," she admitted as if it was a big secret. Harry, while muggle raised himself and knew what Malfoy and others had said from time to time, still didn't make the connection. She sighed and ran a hand through her hair. "It's a lot harder for muggleborns to find work after Hogwarts. It...it's complicated. I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"I do a bit," Harry replied. "I mean, Malfoy's always spouting off about-"

"Potter? Draco Malfoy is small time. Don't get me wrong, he's an arse, but he's small time when it comes to bigotry," she replied. "Muggleborn men have an easier time of it. There's always jobs for men that require a bit more physical strength that the usual pureblood won't touch or thinks is beneath them. For muggleborn women..." she trailed off and shook her head. "It doesn't matter. I won't be here in a couple of months anyway."

"Why's that?" Harry asked as Hermione returned with a bundle of books that she shouldn't have been physically capable of carrying. Harry passed it off as a book based strength similar to how Ron always claimed to have an extra stomach for dessert.

"That means I've got at least five copies of each book so they won't have to share-" she said, her voice vanishing with a Doppler effect as she ran back to the stacks. Harry and Penelope looked at her wake with amazement.

"She really likes books," Penelope said in amazement. "I mean, I'm a Ravenclaw and I like books, but she _REALLY_ likes books."

"She's got some plan for something with the Vault," Harry admitted. "I'm not really sure what it is, but she seems to think it'll work."

"Vault?" Penelope asked. She gave him a curious look. "You mean like Gringott's?"

"No like-" he was cut off by Hermione's return. "Hermione, do you even have enough gold for all these?"

Hermione grinned. "It'll all work out. Since we're going to the Vaults, mum and dad are liquidating everything."

"Potter, if I said UK-13, would it mean anything to you?" Penelope inquired from behind Hermione's latest stack.

"Only that it's the number on my vault ticket," Harry replied not even thinking that most magicals would be completely clueless to his response. "Hermione's too."

Penelope pulled a familiar card out of her purse.

"Oh!" Harry said, suddenly understanding. He turned around. "Hermione! Penelope Clearwater's going to be there with us."

Hermione appeared and beamed. Her smile was so wide it was like a Marianas Trench across her face. She launched herself at the blonde woman and pulled her into a hug. "That's so great. I'm so glad that people Harry and I know are going to be there with us. I thought it was just going to be us even though my folks are in a different vault and I thought we'd be all alone with strangers."

Still being hugged by Hermione, Penelope stood shell-shocked.

"Wait!" Hermione said. "This means we can smuggle in twice as much stuff!"

She was gone again to depopulate the book shelves to an even more severe degree. Penelope turned to Harry with a look of utter confusion. She cocked her head as if to beg for an explanation. Harry shrugged.

"She didn't like being only allowed 5 items, and well, there's a lot of buying power in a Galleon when you take the exchange rate in," Harry admitted. "She's figured out how to get around that."

"But they said-"

"We can hide our stuff with magic!" Hermione answered from behind a new stack of books.

"Do you even have enough money for all this?" Penelope asked.

"Oh yeah," Hermione replied. "I converted pounds to galleons. Five pounds to a galleon. Everything's cheaper in the magical world. Food, books, clothes. Why, for the cost of a meal in the muggle world, I can buy an entire potions set here in Diagon Alley."

"You can?" Penelope asked, looking to Harry for confirmation. "I never thought to do the math."

"I guess," he replied noncommittally. "I don't buy that much."

"Fair enough," the woman agreed with a shrug.

"Oh, it's true," Hermione said. Harry glanced at the books, then back at the shelves then stared at Hermione. She had truly taken almost all the books in the place. Money changed hands and the two teens looked at the mountain of leather backed tomes.

"How are we supposed to carry all this?" he asked.

"If you go down the street and take a left, you'll find Bivouac's Greater Tents and Trunks," Penelope suggested.

"Oh, like Mr. Weasley had at the World Cup," Harry exclaimed.

"Ah, yes, that will do perfectly," Hermione agreed. She sounded slightly manic as she pointed her forefinger at her best friend. "Harry! Guard my books!"

And with that she was out the door. Almost instantly she came back inside.

"I need to borrow some money," she said.

"I thought everything was cheaper here?"

"Yes, but I just thought of more things we need," she admitted. Harry sighed and passed his bag of big city money to her. Hermione snatched it up, and was back out the door.

Harry watched her leave then looked back to Penelope. "This might take a while."

"Well, I'm not too worried. I'm getting commission and I'm following her example," Penelope replied. "I figure I've got 40 potted plants that I don't trust my ex-boyfriend or current roommate to water, so I might as well bring them along. Lots of pictures and holodisks I'd miss if I left them behind. What are you smuggling in?"

"I guess I'll just bring my trunk filled with stuff," Harry said. "My owl. Although I'd think she'd get a bit lonely being the only owl..." He thought about it and decided he was already an accomplice to Hermione's bootlegging operation, so he might as well go whole hog. "I guess I'll go buy some things too."

"I'll keep a 'sold' sign on the stacks here," Penelope said, conjuring it with a wave of her wand.

* * *

In a dark, shadowy building wrapped in mystery and cloaked in daggers, a meeting was taking place. A group of men and women surrounded a large table where they discussed matters of importance.

"So that, ladies and gentlemen, sums up the Vault Program," the speaker explained. "Questions?" He nodded to one man. "Yes, Mr. Prime Minister?"

"What was the purpose of Vault UK-13? Why the blood test?" the Prime Minister inquired.

"The Home Office has noted children who exhibit special abilities that seem to activate during stressful times," the speaker said. "These abilities include telekinesis, adjustments to the mind, changing color of items and even people and sometimes creating fire or even on one occasion, actual teleportation. Usually these events were caught on CCTV or some similar recording device. Often the people later don't even remember the event happening, especially if it was very blatant. We've seen adults who appear out of thin air. We've observed many events that can only be explained by supernatural abilities."

He paused to take a sip of water.

"The UK-13 program is a way of us to breed a group of these individuals who are loyal to the crown. All the children noted for the exceptional events which take place around them have specific genetic markers. By initiating the blood test nation wide, we have discovered nearly five hundred of these individuals in Britain and what is left of French after its last war with Germany. They are almost exclusively children with very few adults."

The Prime Minister listened attentively, nodding at all the right places. He had read the information previously but decided to see how Vault-Tech would use the information. He could read between the lines. These children weren't psychics. They were wizards, witches. While on one hand this would ensure that the children would be true British Citizens and not subject to alternate sets of laws. On the other, this was a breeding ground for untrained wildmages and who knew what that could result in. The concept was not entirely pleasant.

He also knew from personal experience that plans had a tendency to go pear-shaped when wizards were involved. 6 of the last 14 Prime Ministers had attempted to gain further entrance into and/or control over the Wizarding World and failed. Each and every one of them completely forgot about their attempts except for the holodisks that recorded progress. He had a suspicion that this too would fail.

In the end, he just nodded, allowing them to do whatever they wanted. The Vault-Tech liaisons were Americans; they would probably bull ahead regardless, and it wasn't like he could warn them. The Minister of Magic had seen to that.

The speaker gave him a slight bow of thanks and went to the next question. In the end it wouldn't matter.

* * *

"All done," Hermione said, rushing back into the bookstore. She had a multitude of bundles on her back, each rolled up tight. "Time to pack my books."

"_My_ books, you mean," growled a man's voice. Hermione looked up to see an adult version of Victor Crabbe. "I've wanted that book for weeks and as soon as a copy is found, some little mudblood thinks she's going to buy it out from under me?"

"Did you just say you're getting between her and her books? You don't have much of a self preservation instinct, do you?" Harry asked, walking in behind his friend. Then his eyes narrowed as he recognized the man. "Hello Crabbe. Haven't seen you since the Graveyard. How's Tom been?"

The man turned and realized who he was looking at. His eyes narrowed and Harry glared back with growing intensity. Harry palmed his wand, but didn't bring it to bare. He locked vision with the large man, but paid attention to the man's body language with his peripheral vision. The man's hand came up and-

-He was hit in the back with a stunner. Shocked by what happened, Crabbe fell forward, his wand snapping underneath his weight. Harry and Hermione looked up to see a nervous and slightly panicked Penelope Clearwater holding her wand up. They looked at her, looked at the downed Death Eater then at each other.

"Can you hit him with a full body-bind, please?" Harry asked. Still slightly shocked by what she'd just done, the older muggleborn didn't react at first. "Penelope?"

"What? Oh, right," she said, flicking her wand once more. The Death Eater's legs and arms snapped right up to his sides. "I'm not so sure that was the most intelligent thing to do."

"Well, considering he probably was going to at least hurt us, possibly kill us, or worse, bring us to his master, I think you were pretty smart," Harry said. He reached around to his possessions and pulled out another sack like the one his gold had been in earlier. "Help me put him in this."

"Harry? Are you sure this is a good idea?" Hermione asked.

"I'm pretty sure it's not, but I don't have any other plan at the moment," he admitted. Hermione rolled her eyes and huffed, but still helped Harry stuff the Death Eater into the bag of holding. Once it closed over his head, Harry pulled the rope taught, keeping the mouth snug.

"Won't he be able to just burst out?" Hermione asked. "He's big enough."

"No," Penelope replied for him. "Bags and trunks with enlargement charms are specifically enchanted for toughness."

"Why?" Harry inquired innocently.

"One of the worst things that can happen to a room is for a standard dimensional space and an extradimensional space to intersect on more than one plane unless designed to do so from the beginning," the Ravenclaw explained. "I'm not sure of the exact reaction, but everything I've read says it's a very bad thing. The descriptions suggested it's not something we'd like to experiment with."

"And that's why bags are enchanted for strength," Harry said. "Gotcha. So...books?"

After a flurry of activity the trio managed to get everything in Hermione's tents.

"Now, wands," Hermione said with a nod.

"Wands?" Harry and Penelope asked.

"If we're going to be in a vault for decades, our kids are going to need wands," Hermione stated as if it were completely obvious.

"Right," Harry agreed.

"Wait here while I talk to my boss," Penelope said. The girl turned around to stick her head inside the office door behind the sales desk. "Sir, I sold all the books, so I'm going to take the afternoon off."

"What?" the old man asked, waking slightly from his nap. He turned his bleary eyes to her with a bit of confusion. "Fine, fine, but don't expect me to take you back!"

Penelope, confused by the odd response, shrugged and took it as agreement.

"Okay, I'm ready, let's go."

The three of them quickly stepped out of their shop and made their way down to Ollivander's shop. Forgotten behind them, the shop owner sputtered back into his nap.

* * *

Not long after the trio left, the door to the book shop opened, the bell on the door ringing as it was pushed open.

"Hello," the new shopper said. He glanced around, noting the rather empty shelves and missing sales clerk. "Hello?" he called out louder.

"Yes, yes, where is that damn girl?" the old shopkeeper grumbled, not realizing he'd given her the afternoon off. "Or, um, what can I do for you, sir?"

"I'd like to buy some books," the shopper said.

"Well, you've come to the right place," the old man said. "For this is a book shop."

"Yes, well, how about Scarmander's Magical Creatures and Where To Find Them?" the shopper asked.

The keeper glanced through the magically updating stock chart and noted that the last five copies had been sold earlier that afternoon. "Sorry, fresh out."

"All right then, how are you on Lockhart's 'Venting with Veela?'"

"Never at the end of the week sir, but popular title. Get new printings on Monday sir."

"tch! ...No matter then... hmm... How about the Monster Book of Monsters?"

"Well, it's been on order for two weeks sir, I was expecting it this morning."

"My lucky day is it?" the shopper muttered. "Nargles and Bellhops?"

"No sir."

"Harry Potter and the Dunderhead Dragon?"

"Sorry, sir."

"St. Mungos, A History."

"Normally, sir, yes! But today the Floo broke down."

"Wonderful..."

Well, one can see where this was going.

* * *

"Ah, Mr. Potter, Holly and Phoenix feather," Ollivander said the instant the boy opened the door. The old man turned to the two young women with him. "Miss Clearwater and Miss Granger. What can I do for you three?"

"I need to buy all your wands," Hermione said.

"What?" the man asked, utterly stunned. He'd had people ask for replacements, a secondary wand even, but he'd never had someone ask to buy his entire stock before. "Whatever for?"

Hermione reiterated her entire plan at high speed. Ollivander, even with his experience at dealing with hyperactive children excited about their new wands, was barely able to understand what she was talking about.

"What does living in a locked hole in the ground require all my wands?" he asked.

"For the children!" she replied as if it were obvious. The old man turned to the girl's companions for an explanation.

"The vault isn't supposed to open back up for at least a couple of decades," Penelope explained. "The wands are needed for children in the future."

"Ah," the old man said in understanding, "however, the children outside the vault will also need my assistance."

"Not if the bombs drop," Penelope commented darkly under her breath.

"I had a question about wands," Harry said, the encounter with the elder Crabbe getting him thinking about the Graveyard and thusly about everything that happened. "When I fought Voldemort in the Graveyard, our wands collided and made this weird cage thing. Our spells kept hitting each other and moving back and forth. People started flying out of Voldemort's wand, well ghosts kind of."

Ollivander looked at the teen with a mix of amazement and horror. He half covered his gaping mouth with one hand as he tried to figure out what to say.

"Mr. Potter," he began. "Had you not told me that story I would be much more doubtful of the return of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."

"Voldemort didn't know what it was either," Harry said. "I bet he's as confused as me about it. I wouldn't be surprised if he's trying to find out what it means."

"Right," Ollivander said weakly. Harry realized the man was scared as he motioned for the trio to leave the room. "Well, then, out you go."

"What did we do?" Hermione asked. "We still need to-"

"Miss Granger, I'm not going to sell you all my wands," Ollivander said. "Now, if you'll step outside, I'll pack up my shop and join you in this Vault of yours. Wands are no good if your don't have someone to match them."

"Yay!" Hermione screamed. "You can live in one of my tents."

The wandmaker flicked his wand and the shop's shutters snapped closed, the windows and door locked before the entire building seemed to fold in on itself until it was the size of a deck of playing cards. The old man picked up the collapsed building and tucked it into his pocket.

"Now, if you'll allow me," he said. He twitched his nose and a second later was a bright yellow and black Goldfinch that fluttered up off the ground, circled Harry twice and landed on his shoulder.

"That was brilliant!" Hermione said, flashing a smile to the finch animagus. The tiny bird bowed to her on Harry's shoulder.

"You know," Harry commented. "If we're going to be locked up in a vault for decades and we're going to smuggle a whole bunch of things in, what's the point of me keeping things in my bank vault?"

"Even greater!" Hermione exclaimed. "This means we can go buy those other things on my list that I never had the spare cash for."

"If we're buying out Diagon Alley," Penelope said, wondering exactly what she had gotten wrapped up in, "I might as well sell my galleons as bullion and then get the best and the most we can."

"We need to save as many people as we can too," Hermione said. "Especially now that we have the cash and space."

If any of them had been thinking clearly and not been caught up in the excitement of Hermione Breaking the Rules (which was so rare it did deserve a bit of celebration), they would have realized that Vault-Tech had those rules for rather good reasons, although the impact of these events would not show themselves until much later.

* * *

"Hey, Shack, what's happening?" Tonks asked as she was getting ready to head to Amelia Bones' office. The tall black man held up a bundle of files and "lost" them in his circular filing cabinet that had a very strange resemblance to a rubbish bin.

"Oh, I just 'lost' those files after I apprehended some dangerous criminals outside Gringott's," Shacklebolt replied. "Without those files, Lucius Malfoy will have a rather difficult time retrieving his son from lock up. Of course, he could just bribe him free like he usually does, but without the proper paperwork, it would look like a break out to the bureaucracy. And that's a terrible thing to have on a young wizard's history."

"A shame that could happen to such an upstanding individual," Tonks replied dryly. "Good thing you filled it all out."

"I know, and I'd be willing to take a Wizard's oath that I did so, too," Shack replied.

"Such an honest auror. The Wizarding World knows it can trust you, because of it," Amelia said from behind them. Shacklebolt and Tonks froze, but the latter glanced up and saw the smile on her boss's face. "Tonks, my office please?"

They stepped inside and Amelia closed the door behind them. In a loud voice she said: "How has that shoplifting case in Knockturn Alley been going?"

She wrote a note on a pad and passed it to the younger woman. "Bones residence, 8pm."

Tonks nodded. "Quite well. We think that one of the other shops has been reselling the goods to unsuspecting citizens. And it's been going on for some time. I mean, who knows how long Maxine's Assorted Goods as been selling stolen items without them knowing it," Tonks replied, specifically choosing Delores Umbridge's favorite shop. They'd customize dinnerware with the personality and images of dead pets much like magical artists would paint portraits of family members so they could stay around after they died. To Amelia she nodded in agreement.

"That's a shame," Amelia replied, keeping up the pretenses. "Imagine the scandal if the Minister or other high official was found to have bought stolen items. Why it would be terrible for their careers."

"Yes, I sure hope no one like an undersecretary has made the big mistake of buying from there," Tonks agreed in a slightly louder than normal voice so the listening charms Umbridge had set up could catch it all.

"Yes," Amelia agreed. "Good luck on the rest of your investigation."

"Thank you director," Tonks replied before stepping out. Kingsley was waiting for her. He stepped right up next to her as they made their way back to the Auror Head Office.

"Potter and Granger had a run in with lesser Malfoy and assorted goons in the Alley," he reported in hushed tones. "Flint was in the process of a cruciatus curse on Granger when I interrupted."

"Ah, the 'lost' files?" Tonks asked.

"Precisely," Kingsley said. "Luckily it was just after lunch, so the place was pretty deserted. Moody's been disillusioned under an invisibility cloak trailing them to keep them safe."

"You'd think that just one or the other would be enough," Tonks commented.

"This is Moody," Kingsley reminded her. She nodded agreement and let him continue.

"Moody reports that something they said had Ollivander pack up shop," the tall man explained. "The whole store's gone. Granger has been buying up the entire alley from books to clothes to plants. Potter bought every snowy owl and every single owl treat they had."

"They had a run in with Elder Crabbe, but Clearwater-"

"The Headgirl who used to date Arthur and Molly's middle boy, right? What's his name? The one after Charlie," Tonks asked.

"Yes, that one. Anyway, she hit Crabbe with a stunner from behind," Kingsley explained. "The three of them stuffed him in a sack and have been carrying him around ever since. His disappearance, even with the fact that he's notorious for his stupidity outside of a few dark spells, is going to cause some problems. Dumbledore is worried that Voldemort might strike out in revenge."

"As for Clearwater," Kingsley continued. "She's got a ticket to the same vault and has been buying almost as much as the others. They seem to be focusing on storage containers that are easily disguised as muggle items. Clearwater has taken all her money from her Gringott's vault, taken it to the muggle world and come back with huge bundles of cash which she then exchanged into more galleons. If they do that too much, they could break the economy."

"Well, if the muggles are right, it won't matter," Tonks commented under her breath.

"I know," Kingsley replied. "Things muggleside are getting tense. Very tense. The wars on the continent are threatening to spill across the Channel and I heard from a contact from my hit-wizard days that China has armed the missiles three times in the last month before calling them off. Muggles in America are getting complacent with all the false alarms. Vault-Tech London is considering bumping up the schedule since the PM has made vault registration mandatory here."

"That's not good," Tonks replied. "Bones has me working on setting up ways to smuggle political hostages like her niece or the Longbottom boy into the vault. She'll set up Portkeys for if it doesn't go down."

"Bill's talked to the Goblins," Kingsley replied. "They'll safeguard some humans, but any wizard or witch who takes refuge with them will be subject to Goblin law and customs while they're inside."

"That's understandable but troublesome," Tonks replied.

"Exactly, especially considering the majority of people in the Wizarding World only know they rebel and bank," Kingsley grumbled. "I don't know what Albus is thinking, keeping that ghost on."

"And word on the mirrors?"

"Remus and Filius have made three so far. Now that they've fixed a few problems with the originals, they think they can enchant two per day," the older auror replied. "They've got Padfoot melting down Sickles for the silver."

"Goblins won't like that," Tonks commented with a dark chuckle.

"I don't think it's that important to inform them of it," her partner replied. "How did the latest attempt to get Molly to let you smuggle in her kids go?"

Tonks let out a growl of aggravation. "I don't know what's wrong with those two."

"Two? More like the one. Molly's the only one making a scene," Kingsley grumbled as they dodged a few flying memos that buzzed them like WWI biplanes.

"Can't she understand they'll be safer in the Vault? And if the muggles are wrong, we just crack it open and walk out. Then, surprise! The Weasleys are back again," Tonks complained.

"I don't know, she just doesn't seem to want to listen to reason," Kingsley said with a sad shake of her head. "I think it has to do with Ron being chosen as prefect."

"We both know it would be Harry if he weren't going to the vault," Tonks said. "This is just going to be terrible for everyone involved."

"And especially for those who think they're not involved," Kingsley agreed. "Arthur was telling me that he heard through the grapevine that Fudge isn't allowing any hint that _anything_ could possibly be going wrong. He won't listen to reason and that toad of his just keeps filling his ears with vitriol that he spouts right back out. It could fall any day and the Wizarding World is a sitting duck."

"I hate it that all these people I know are going to die and there's nothing I can do about it," Tonks muttered bitterly. The two of them flattened against the wall to let several office workers make their way passed.

"We all know what Fudge would say if we told him," Kingsley replied. "We'd be out of a job and our face would be right there next to Potter's being lambasted in the Prophet."

"Merlin, I hate that paper," Tonks grumbled.

"You and me both," her partner agreed. "The only silver lining in all this is that the muggles will take out the Death Eaters at the same time."

"More like the stainless steel lining. With almost all of us dead, I don't think it qualifies as silver, but it's still shiny," Tonks replied.

"You might be right about that."

* * *

"So, we've bought all this stuff, what next?" Penelope Clearwater inquired.

"The Garden Store," replied Hermione.

"The Garden Store?" Harry asked.

"The Garden Store," confirmed Hermione.

"Okay, I'll bite," Penelope grumbled. "Why?"

"Apparently all Vault lights are designed to perfectly mimic sunlight, so plants and humans can thrive," Hermione said.

"-So we need to stock up on seeds, soil and supplies, right," Penelope finished for her. "Where are we getting the money from all this?"

"Harry's got a lot of money and my parents have managed to sell their practice and most of the non-personal items since they want to transcribe all the photos and family information on holodisks and holotapes," Hermione explained. "There's plenty of people who don't believe the bombs will fall, so they'll buy whatever we're selling so long as we price it right. It's amazing how much money you can make if you don't care about keeping anything."

"Have you told them you're smuggling half the world into our vault?" Harry asked his friend.

"Haven't been home, so not yet, but if we can manage to get some kind of portkey, I might be able to bring them over to our vault so my family can be together," Hermione explained. "I've already decided to smuggle in my grandparents, all four of them, so I'll need a way to get my parents to UK-13 as well."

"You really don't do anything by halves, do you?" Penelope asked. "Considering the two times we spoke more than to just say 'hello' were just before we both got petrified and today, you really go all out when you've made a decision, don't you?"

Harry didn't say anything but was nodding his head vigorously from behind Hermione.

"I wouldn't say that I go overboard," Hermione said, with Harry shaking his head in disagreement. "But I do try my best when I set my mind to things."

Harry shrugged and nodded in agreement.

"Why don't you two head to the garden store while I go see Mr. Weasley?" Harry suggested. "Come find me if you need more money. All that gold won't do me any good if I leave it in the bank and I'm in a completely different vault. I want to see if we can save the Weasleys too."

"Oh, you should owl some of our other friends, too," Hermione agreed.

"I don't know how much good it'll do, but I'll try," Harry replied with a nod. And with that, they went their separate ways.

Hermione and Penelope took Harry's large bag of gold and went to the Herbology supply shop and bought everything they could, setting up their magical tent and storing the copious amounts of soil, dragon dung manure (charmed to be scentless) and seeds inside. Harry went to the Ministry of Magic with the invisible Mad-Eye Moody trailing behind. It's a shame the Death Eaters didn't know there was an invisible, cloaked Mad-Eye Moody on the loose, because there are few things more terrifying to a Death Eater than an invisible, cloaked Mad-Eye Moody.

After getting direction and ignoring the cold, unfriendly stares directed his way, Harry Potter eventually found his way to the Office of Misuse of Muggle Artifacts, Arthur Weasley Director.

"Harry? What are you doing here?" Arthur said in surprise.

"Hermione and I are buying supplies for the Vault," Harry siad. "Do you know about the vault?"

"I've heard the rumors, yes," Arthur replied, not quite sure as to how much he could give away without giving away the whole shebang about the Order and all. "You're going to live there?"

"Me and Hermione," Harry said. "A lot of other people. Percy's ex-girlfriend is assigned to the same vault as us."

"Well, she's a nice girl, Molly was terribly upset when they broke up," Arthur commented. "It's good that people you know are going to be there. What brings you here today? Saying goodbye?"

"No, or at least I hope not," Harry said. "Hermione's figured a way to smuggle more people and supplies in and I was hoping we could convince your family to join us."

Arthur looked down at the boy sadly.

"While I would love to know our children are safe with you, Molly is wary of muggle protections," Arthur replied. "We're in the process of building a protective bunker in a safe place." He inwardly cursed the Fidelius charm, as he was unable to let Harry in on the secret.

"Oh, well, I'm sorry you won't join us, but I'm glad you're taking precautions," Harry replied glumly.

"Hopefully we can have a little pre-vault party for you and your friends," Arthur replied.

"That would be great," Harry said, getting a little less depressed. Arthur looked at the boy's face with a father's eye.

"Harry..." he trailed off before making sure he had the boy's full attention. "How are you doing with... With what happened to the Diggory boy?"

It was like cold water had rushed over him. Harry's shoulders hung down, his body slouched. Hope and any amount of happiness vanished from his face.

"It's not easy to lose someone you know," Arthur said, putting a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Molly was much the same during the last war when she lost her brothers."

"It's my fault," Harry said. "I should have known."

"Harry," Arthur said kindly. "No, there's no reason you should have expected such a vile thing to happen. You hoped for the best and there is nothing wrong with that. Nothing."

"I just wish I'd gotten to know him better," Harry said, his voice filled with sorrow. "We barely knew each other, but we had so much in common. I wish..."

"I can't say it will get better; there's no easy solution to dealing with grief," Arthur said. "Frankly, I hope losing people never gets easy, but eventually you learn to deal with it. It takes time. Talk to your friends. Make connections. Don't cut yourself off."

"I won't. I mean, I didn't mean to," the boy replied. "I've been distracting myself."

"Distractions don't last, Harry," Arthur said, holding the boy by the shoulders. They locked gazes as Arthur tried to comfort him. "They work for a little while, but you need to deal with this."

"I will," Harry said. Both were quiet for a long while. Harry glanced at the clock. "I should go. Hermione and Penelope are probably waiting for me. Tell Ron I said to stay safe until we meet again. Ginny and the twins too."

"I will, Harry," Arthur said. Harry turned and walked out the door. A moment later he stuck his head back in.

"Mr. Weasley?"

"Yes, Harry?"

"Thank you."

"You're welcome, Harry."

Harry left once more.

Then he stuck his head back in.

"Yes, Harry?"

"The vault thingy you're making?" Harry asked. Arthur nodded for him to continue. "Make sure you line the walls and doors with lead."

"Lead? Whatever for?" Arthur asked.

"It's a safety thing. It helps protect from radiation, then you can make the inside look like whatever you want, just make sure all the walls, doors, windows and everything have at least three inches of lead," Harry instructed. "And make sure it seals tight."

"I suppose we could charm the windows to look clear, while still being covered in lead," Arthur replied. "Would transfigured lead work?"

"I have absolutely no idea," Harry said honestly. "But you should be able to find some, right?"

"I'll certainly look," Arthur agreed. And Harry left for real this time. Arthur Weasley pondered the idea of a lead house for a while before asking a simple question. "What is rayed-ee-eh-shun and why do we need to protect against it?"

* * *

"So, did you get everything you wanted?" Harry asked his fellow future vault dwellers. They were waiting for him outside the pet store.

"We ran out of money after filling the third tent," Hermione replied with an annoyed huff.

"What are we doing with the tents? I mean, we can't just carry five tents in and expect them not to think something's strange," Harry asked.

"I'm going to shrink them, which doesn't effect the size of the extradimensional space inside the tent and then we'll hide them in a mokeskin pouch," Penelope said, holding up a very small piece of leather the size of a small change purse.

"You can do that?" Harry asked. The Ravenclaw nodded. "But why mokeskin?"

"Because only the owner of the object can pull it out again," Hermione said excitedly.

"Oh, well, that's good," Harry said. "Just make sure you own everything you put in there."

"Yep! Either I or you will own everything in it," Hermione agreed. She paused as something occurred to her. "Although I'm not sure how we're going to save our schoolmates this way."

"Have them write a note giving you temporary ownership that ends when they're pulled out of the pouch," Penelope suggested.

"Unorthodox, but reasonable," Hermione said, nodding. "Now we need to shop in the muggle world. But first to the bank for the rest of Harry's money!"

Harry sighed. "At least muggle money is paper and not gold."


	5. Chapter 5

"Hermione," her mother said slowly as she took in the humungous pile of things her daughter purchased sitting in the middle of the living room. "I thought the point was to relax from your list, not add things to it."

"I've solved it!" Hermione said proudly.

"Solved it?" Menelaus asked. "Solved what?"

"The limit! I've figured it all out!" she declared excitedly. "Penelope helped."

"Penelope? Who's Penelope?" Helen asked in confusion. The blonde woman raised a hand as she stepped out from behind the mountain of enlarged tents, bags of holding, traveling trunks and other extradimensionally enlarged containers.

"That would be me," the young woman said nervously. "Hello. Um, nice to meet you?"

"Hello," both parents said, giving her a confused wave. Hermione's parents turned back to their daughter. "Why don't you explain from the _beginning_?" her father suggested.

"And where's Harry?" her mother inquired.

"He's sending out his flock of owls to our friends who live on the magical side of things so we can save them from the bombs," Hermione explained.

"I'm with your father," her mother said. "Let's start at the beginning."

* * *

Harry's letters were quite simple. They included a copy of the information packet he got from Vault-Tech (generously copied by Penelope) and a letter asking that they consider Hermione's plan. He explained briefly the muggle war and what was happening and what people thought could happen. He addressed them to each family of every student he knew, except for those whose parents he knew were Death Eaters, and asked them for a return letter.

Unfortunately for everyone, Harry would not get the response he hoped for. While if this had happened a year earlier, people would have probably paid attention to his words, this year Harry's reputation was quite tainted. Constant disparaging comments from Fudge via the Prophet and other publications had ruined almost all credibility the boy had. After his warning that Voldemort had returned and the Minister's reaction to it, his letter was seen as just another attempt at an attention whore at getting more attention. His warning was almost entirely disregarded except for a select few.

Hundreds would suffer the consequences of Fudge's arrogance and refusal to see the truth.

* * *

"Wait," Menelaus Granger said, holding up a hand. "let me get this straight. You're going to use magic to bypass the rules to save people's lives and to ensure that your children have a magical education?"

"Yes, precisely," Hermione said.

"Have you considered why they might have those rules?" Helen asked. "They might have very good reasons for the limits."

"Yes, but magic can fill in the blanks," Hermione said. "We might even be able to visit each other's vaults."

"There are magical items that allow for communication, Mrs. Granger," Penelope explained. "I could easily set one up so that you could keep in contact with Hermione. Without arranging something specific, I'm not sure about travel, but communication is certainly possible."

"Think of all the people we'll save, Dad, Mum," Hermione pleaded. The two adults shared a look, their expressions neutral, as together they sought to find the right response.

"Okay," her mother said finally. "So long as you're sure it's safe for everyone involved. I don't want you to end up hurting an entire vault to save a few people."

"We won't," Hermione said. "I've thought of everything."

"We're serious," Menelaus stressed. "As sad as the idea of your friends dieing is, I don't want you to try to save a few and doom the many."

"For all we know, overcrowding might cause the vault not to shut," her mother cautioned.

That gave Hermione a bit of pause. "If that's the case, we'll just have to shut it ourselves. They can't snap my wand if they can't find me."

Hermione's parents had rarely, if ever, seen this side of their daughter. In their experience, Hermione rarely did anything that wasn't according to the rules. She had been a very obedient girl, and perhaps that strictness to the rules was what caused her to be ostracized in primary school. Now older, fifteen, nearly sixteen, she was a young woman, no longer just a girl, and had developed a streak of occasionally breaking the rules. As Harry had noted, when she broke the rules, she didn't just do so half way.

"The owls are away," Harry said as he walked into the room. Heads turned to him and it was only then that he noticed the tense atmosphere. "Is this about Hermione breaking the rules?"

Her parents nodded.

"It's okay," Harry said. "She only breaks the rules when people's safety is in danger, then there's no stopping her."

"Hermione's a rule breaker?" the girl's parents asked in utter confusion.

"Only when it counts," Harry said. "When lives are on the line. Like the time she set a teacher's robes on fire when I was being hexed off my broom. Or when a mass murderer was after a magical artifact and we had to stop him. Or when the Ministery of Idiots was going to have my godfather's soul sucked out."

"When you tell those things out of context, it really sounds bad, Harry," Hermione chided. Harry looked at her with a look of confusion almost equal to her parents'.

"Even in context they were bad. If not worse," Harry replied.

"She did save my life when there was a basilisk loose in Hogwarts," Penelope Clearwater put in. "It's gaze normally kills, but Hermione figured out a way to lessen the effect."

The two elder Grangers looked at Hermione as if she was an alien they had never seen before.

She shrunk down slightly and blushed.

"She's saved my life several times," Harry said. "If she hadn't helped me with the summoning charm, I'd have been eaten by a dragon. Oh, don't worry, she wasn't in any danger that time. Not like when we were in the Forbidden Forest running from a werewolf and soul sucking dementors or the time when Voldemort was eating unicorns there."

"Harry?" Hermione asked sweetly.

"Yeah?"

"Please stop helping," she answered in the same sweet voice. "You're acting a bit like Ronald."

"I am?" Harry asked. He turned back to the Grangers. "But don't worry, we'll be in a vault and hidden away, so it will be much more difficult for those kinds of things to happen."

"It will be okay, really," Hermione said with a tinge of worry slipping into her voice. "And those things are out of context and not really representative of our school life. Really. Those are very rare, isolated incidents."

With that last statement, she gave Harry a not-so-subtle look for him to keep his trap shut. Expressing wisdom that often avoided him, Harry did not make another comment on the subject. No one said anything for quite a while.

"Um," Penelope Clearwater asked nervously. "Is it okay if I stay here? All my stuff is here and I'd like to pack it all up."

The elder Grangers looked at each other, sighed and then waved for her to do whatever.

* * *

Over the next few weeks, Harry's owls returned. Hedwig, clearly the boss, stayed with him the entire time, but he waited. A few owls had rejection letters, but most came back empty.

"I don't understand," Harry said, in an exasperated tone. "They don't say anything at all, or they think I'm making it all up. I don't get why people are calling me a liar and a freak. All I'm doing is trying to save lives."

"Harry, just because people returned an owl without a response doesn't mean they aren't thinking about what you have to say," Hermione said.

As if on cue, the front door chimed. Her parents still at work as they tried to wrap up the last few appointments left before they packed up the practice for the vault (having come around to Hermione's point of view), and Penelope trying to convince some friends of hers to join them, there was no reason for anyone to visit.

Hermione opened the door to find an unexpected surprise.

"Professor Dumbledore?" the girl asked in surprise. "What brings you here today?"

"You and Mr. Potter, actually," Dumbledore replied. "May I come in?"

Hermione stepped away and motioned for him to join them. He saw the living room and chuckled.

"I had heard about your escapades in Diagon Alley, but had not expected this," the old man commented with a laugh. Hermione blushed brightly at being caught. The headmaster waved them down and shook his head. "No worries. Perhaps we should all sit down."

When the three of them were settled, Dumbledore pulled out three packages. He handed two to Hermione and one to Harry. "Presents from Sirius and Remus. One of those is for your parents, Miss Granger."

"What are they?" Harry asked.

"Open them up and see," the professor told them kindly.

"Mirrors?" Harry asked.

"Special mirrors, Harry," Dumbledore said, pulling up his glasses so he could look at the mirror. "Padfoot's Pad." He paused a moment before the sound of a bell lit up from the glass.

"Professor! So I assume you've arrived?" the sound of Sirius Black said from the mirror.

"Yes, I was just showing Harry and Miss Granger how they worked," Dumbledore replied, using his reading specs to see the man's image on the glass. He glanced over to where the teens were gaping in amazement. Dumbledore passed the mirror back to its new owner. "You see, Harry, say either the residence or person you want to speak to, and if they've got a mirror, you can speak with them."

"Sirius?" Harry asked.

"Hello, Harry," his godfather replied. "Good to see you."

"Are you back? What's going on?" Harry asked excitedly, Hermione crowding in beside him.

"I'm around, but we probably won't be able to see each other before you head to the vault," Sirius explained.

"You know?" the teens demanded.

Sirius and Dumbledore nodded. "Someone we know spotted you at the Vault-Tech informational."

"But-"

"Harry, you're safest where you are now and then in the vault," Sirius said. "We might not be able to be around each other physically, but that doesn't mean we can't talk on a regular basis. No range limit. Takes messages, buzzes if you've got a caller."

"I wanted to see you," Harry said.

"And I wanted to see you, but it's too dangerous for me right now and too dangerous for you to be out in public," Sirius argued. "The most important thing for me is that you be safe. More than anything else. You're my godson, and even if I wasn't around for most of your life, I'm not going to endanger you just to hang out. And this way, we're never out of touch."

"There's a whole group of people who have these mirrors," Dumbledore explained. "We wanted to be able to keep in touch and this was the best way for us to do so."

"It's an old Marauder invention," Sirius explained. "We'll give you the instructions on how to make them and how to link them up to the network of mirrors." He grinned. "there's other presents too."

Dumbledore passed Harry a large box.

"This is everything we could find of your parents, their lives and some other personal items," Dumbledore said. "Everything from your father's Quidditch trophy to your mother's charms notes when she was working on her mastery. Unfortunately, she was never able to achieve it, since she went into hiding, but she was a Charms mistress in all but name. The third present is for the both of you."

He held out a small trunk.

"This contains a copy of every book in my collection, your mother's collection, the Black Family Library, the Hogwarts Library and several others," he said. "I'd heard you were worried about the future, and we wouldn't want that to happen."

Hermione almost looked like she was about to drool. Her fingers twitched.

"It's charmed to open as soon as you enter the vault," Dumbledore said with a chuckle at her disappointment. "The books on top have many charms for managing a library and enchanting buildings for size. Should be useful."

"Thankyouthankyouthankyouthan kyou!" Hermione said as she tackle-glomped the old man, much to his surprise. With a light chuckle he patted her on the head and managed to extricate himself from her grasp.

"Yes, yes," he said. "However, I do have a request of you, Harry."

"Anything," the boy agreed.

"A dangerous thing to volunteer," Dumbledore said with a chuckle. "But not this time. I simply need you to open the Chamber of Secrets."

Harry's eyes grew wide.

"Why would you want that?"

"Well, to be honest," Dumbledore began, "we'd like to have it open to the full school, as it is a part of our history. Second, we'd like to ensure that nothing else is a danger to the school there. And thirdly, and perhaps most important, is simple incurable curiosity about the place. Only you, Fawkes and Miss Weasley have been there and I must admit, I do want to see this basilisk."

"Sure," Harry said. "But we should clear it with the Grangers first."

"I'm coming too," Hermione said.

"Why don't we bring your parents as well, Miss Granger," Dumbledore suggested. "It's rare that the parents of muggleborns are able to see the school their children spend so much time in."

"I'm sure they'd love to go," Hermione said. And she was right. The Grangers accepted almost the moment it was proposed.

* * *

"Is it just me, or is Hogwarts a bit scary now?" Harry asked. The formerly red stone and brick looked like it had some kind of sludge creeping up the walls.

"That would be the lead you mentioned to Mr. Weasley," Dumbledore explained.

"I was thinking of somewhere smaller, but this works," Harry replied.

"Why are you covering the school in lead?" Mrs. Granger asked.

"From what we've been able to determine, Hogwarts is not near any large target," Dumbledore explained. "I truly have no idea if it is going to work, but we've been hoping to turn this into a vault of our own, so to speak, should the worst occur."

"Where are you getting the lead?" Hermione asked. "It must be very expensive."

"Professor Flitwick has developed a mining charm that allows metals to be pulled towards the caster directly from the stone," Dumbledore explained. "It's a combination summoning and detection charm. And, to our great surprise, there was an old abandoned lead mine not too far from here."

"So you're literally just pulling it out of the ground?" Mr. Granger asked.

"Yes, it does make mining quite easier than muggles do it, and allows us to circumvent the normal process to extract the ore, which is a much more pleasant experience," Dumbledore agreed before continuing. "We've also acquired a growing stock of gold bullion that I'm not sure what to do with."

"You could fix that illusionary step on the moving staircase," Harry suggested, rubbing his shin in phantom pain.

"I doubt it would surprise you that you are not the first to suggest that, nor, in fact, the tenth," Dumbledore replied with a playful grin. "But we'll add it to the growing list. There's copper and silver in lesser quantities that we retrieved from some abandoned mines in England. Just for testing."

"Of course," Mr. Granger agreed with a grin. "Any chance you could teach Hermione that spell?"

"I could, of course, but unfortunately, it wouldn't help Miss Granger since the Ministry would cause trouble so long as she was out of school, and unfortunately, we do not have any known precious metal deposits on the campus," Dumbledore said as they walked up to the doors of the castle. "Welcome, Mr and Mrs. Granger, to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

Like everyone who walked into the castle for the first time, the Grangers looked up and gaped.

"I so enjoy seeing that on people's faces," Dumbledore admitted. "I really should override the board and have that Parent/Teacher day I've always wanted." He paused and his expression darkened. "Well, I suppose that won't happen right now."

"There's a saying," Mr. Granger said. "'Hope for the best, but plan for the worst.' I think it applies here."

"Yes, I very much agree," Dumbledore said. "Now, if you'll look to your left, this is where Hermione, Harry and their friend Ronald Weasley encountered a mountain troll. Between the two of them with some fine casting and quick thinking for first years, Ronald and Harry managed to subdue it." His eyes twinkled. "Your daughter lied to the faculty and took the blame, even though she was completely innocent. And the boys were only looking out for her, and therefore would have not been punished."

Hermione was bright red and didn't even see Harry's bemused expression.

"I'm glad we got the whole story or this would have been a bit more startling," Mr. Granger admitted. "Are these events common?"

"Unfortunately, the last four years yes, well outside of the Defense professor," Dumbledore admitted. "Every time we take precautions to safeguard the children something happens."

"Like Lucius Malfoy sicking a giant venomous snake with death vision on the school," Harry put in.

"Was he punished?" Mrs. Granger asked.

"There was no evidence, even if we know beyond a doubt that he was guilty," Dumbledore admitted. "And even then he has deep pockets and plenty of 'contributions' to go around."

"He _bribes_ people?" the Grangers asked, positively scandalized.

"Oh yes, and he's rather blatant about it," Dumbledore replied. "And he's not punished for that because the people he bribes are in charge of the people who would ordinarily punish him. Add to that the fact that those same people are also in charge of the courts, we have a much greater problem."

"I'd say you do. Racism, bribery, corruption, attempted murderers walking away Scot-free," Menelaus Granger grumbled. "I don't see much to like about your government."

"Ah, yes, I expect you've been speaking to Miss Clearwater, then?" the Headmaster inquired. The Grangers nodded. "Hers is a particular tragedy in my opinion. Brilliant girl, personable, witty. Skilled with a wand to a point where one might call her an artist of spellwork. Unfortunately the only Ministry heads who would hire her would do so for her pretty face and, shall we say, _other_ outward bits of anatomy rather than the brain that powers her. And I can assure you, I am just as disgusted about it as you are."

"Here it is, Myrtle's residence," Dumbledore said, standing before a girl's lavatory.

"Why are we in a lady's lavatory?" Mrs. Granger asked.

"Because either Slytherin was a pervert of the highest caliber, or this room was converted at a later point in history," Dumbledore explained. "As I'm sure your daughter can tell you, Hogwarts was, at one point, much larger in population to the point that there were three instructors for every subject instead of one for each as it is today. This wing was the 1-3 year wing for Charms and Transfiguration."

"Ah, I think that goes from 'pervert of the highest to caliber' to 'disgusting sicko pedophile' in my honest opinion," Mr. Granger said.

"I think quite a few would agree with you, as do I, because I can't see how a lavatory could be installed and have the entrance marked on a facet after the fact," Dumbledore said in agreement, pointing to a little squiggly mark on one sink. "Harry, if you will..."

_"Open," _Harry hissed. The Grangers jumped at the sound issuing forth from the boy's mouth. Parsletongue isn't just a hissing sound. It's an unnatural noise when it comes from a human's mouth. When snakes hiss, it usually means they're upset and therefore about to strike, which naturally makes listeners nervous. But when it came to human mouths issuing the same sounds, there was just something intrinsically wrong about that sound. Harry shrugged at his companions' discomfort, but the Grangers were equally unnerved as the entrance opened before them like a snake's maw widening to swallow them whole.

They made their way down the tunnel, Dumbledore transfiguring supports to the ceiling and steps in the tunnel. Eventually they made it to the next door and into the gigantic room Harry remembered all too well.

"YOU FOUGHT THAT?" all three Grangers exclaimed. The last few years had not served the Basilisk well. Harry had been running on adrenalin and phoenix tears the last time he'd seen the thing and if anything, it was a mite more scary now that it had time to decompose. The skin was whole, clinging to the skeleton like a wet tent over poles, but the flesh had liquified and drained out either end in putrid pools on the stone floor. Once out of the body, it had become a fertile bed for fungi, in particular a type that seemed to glow in the dark slightly with a nasty purple tinge. The fangs, save for the one Harry had removed to stab the diary, hung out of its mouth like a series of great knives lined up side by side. The holes where its eyes had once been now sagged towards the ground, turning them into obscene ovals that seemed focused on whoever was in the room.

"Oh my," Dumbledore exclaimed. "Harry, my boy, when you said it was big, this is a bit more than I had imagined at the time."

Harry just shrugged. "It looks smaller now."

"Yes, well, growing as much as you have since then will do that," Dumbledore replied. He flicked his wand and the torches sprung up about him in a blaze of light. "Yes, this might do nicely."

"For what?" Hermione asked as she got over the big giant snake. It was easy to see how Ginny would call Harry a hero for killing something that big.

"For a secondary greenhouse, Miss Granger," Dumbledore explained. "And now that we're down here, I can break the parsletongue enchantments and allow anyone to enter. Thank you Harry."

Harry just gave a slightly non-committal grunt.

"I wonder what else is down here," Harry pondered. "I didn't really have time to explore. The snake came out of that hole over there and there are plenty of these other tunnels. Might be something very interesting so long as Voldemort left it behind when he first showed up."

"I suppose that depends on your definition of 'interesting' something we're not going to test at the moment," Menelaus commented dryly. "Personally, I think we should go explore. Harry, why don't we go look at that missing step you mentioned earlier?"

The boy shrugged but was perfectly willing to go with the flow. He didn't have any good memories of the Chamber of Secrets, anyway. As they gave the tour, the two adult Grangers noticed that Harry didn't really have any good memories of Hogwarts either, which made his assertion that it was his first real home all the more disturbing. Almost every place they visited was "I was nearly killed here" or "Malfoy tried to hex me here" or "over there is where I almost got bitten by a werewolf." It was disturbing to think the boy considered Hogwarts a nicer place than his aunt and uncle's. Hell, this was a place where most of the school treated him like he was a mass murderer simply because he knew how to hiss in a special way. Granted, it was a creepy hiss, but it didn't deserve the reaction it got. That's not even getting into the kids' 4th year. That tournament was a nightmare.

The more the two teens talked about their adventures, the more the Grangers thought the Vaults were a better idea. Sure, they might not ever get to see Hermione in person again, but at least they'd get to speak more often, and in video. Knowing she was safe was more than enough for the couple. Still, it was wonderful to learn of the world she had lived in for the past four and something years.

* * *

"Yes, Sirius, the Basilisk hide is still intact, why?" Dumbledore asked later on at the Order meeting.

"I just think Harry deserves something for killing it. What could be better than a new coat?" Sirius replied with a grin. "And some new glasses. He tends to squint in the sunlight."

"Oh, not the aviators," Remus moaned.

"He'd look awesome in aviators," Sirius protested. "And hey, whatever happened to my motorbike?"

"Hagrid still uses it. Prefers it to-" Albus cut himself off and stared at the younger man. "Are you doing what I think you're doing?"

Sirius Black leaned back in his chair, tucked his hands behind his head and smirked.

"Sirius Black, I doubt that setting him up as some kind of lone wanderer with a Union Jack plastered across his back is a good idea at this stage," Remus criticized.

"Hey, you can't complain about my ideas being bad. _I_ wasn't the one who decided to act as a courier to the werewolves and almost got a silver bullet in the head," Sirius replied.

"And yet, even when getting shot at, my idea was still more successful than yours," Remus pointed out.

"What are you talking about?" Tonks asked in confusion. "Harry's just going to be a Vault Dweller, so why does any of this stuff matter?"

"Sirius used to dress up as a 'lone wanderer' to pick up girls at clubs," Remus said.

"Did the 'lone wanderer' thing ever work?" Tonks asked, looking like she was about to burst into laughter.

"No," Remus said, cutting off his friend. "It never, ever worked."

"Sure it did! Don't you remember that time when I met that girl with the leather?" Sirius asked.

"He thought you were a paying customer," Remus informed him.

"What?" Sirius replied, completely flabbergasted. Sirius shook his head and changed the subject rather than confront his own insecurities. "What's the plan with Harry?"

"Vault Day is August 1st," Tonks reported. "That's the day the doors close and there's no getting out until the danger has passed."

"The day after Harry's birthday," Sirius commented.

"Odd birthday present," one of the other Order members commented. "What about the letters, do you think he'll get any takers?"

"Most of the people who would be interested are already being smuggled by me, or are in on our other project," Tonks reported. "There are a few more, but it's hard to tell. Harry sent one to almost everyone he knew, save for Death Eaters."

"That's a bit of a concern," Dumbledore commented glumly. "In the letter, did he say what vault he was in?"

"Not in the letter I received," an Order member reported. "Only that it existed."

"Troubling. I do hope we can stop Voldemort from invading any vault," the old man commented. "They would be like sitting ducks."

"I'm not so sure," Tonks said. "Those Mr. Handy robots can do some real damage if they have to. I wouldn't want to be on the wrong end of a Plasma Defender or whatever they're packing."

"Yes, yes, quite right," Dumbledore muttered as he glanced down at his notes briefly. "UK-13 is the vault in question, correct Nymphadora?"

"Yes, and don't call me Nymphadora," Tonks replied.

"Perhaps we should just add a few reasonable precautions against magical attack and transportation," Dumbledore said, completely ignoring her naming demand.

"I've got some time off coming up," Bill replied, repositioning himself in his chair. "I could take care of that for you. They're Ron's friends. I want to do my part."

"Ah, yes, thank you William," Dumbledore replied. "Very well, then we shall continue on the morrow."

* * *

It was easy enough for a wizard to find out the location of UK-13, if one had a little knowledge of the muggle world. A few notice-me-not spells and a dissillusionment charm, Bill was in and out of Vault-Tech London with the information he needed and on his way to the white cliffs of Dover, leaving the Securitrons looking for a muggle spy with a Stealth-Boy.

When Bill arrived at the Vault, he was surprised to find it wide open with very few guards other than a few of those muggle golems. Luckily for him, confundus charms work equally well against AI's as they do regular people. Convinced he was an expected worker, Bill Weasley set to work.

It should be noted that William Weasley and Albus Dumbledore have very different opinions of what constitutes "reasonable precautions" when it comes to ward scheme. Dumbledore would have just put up an unplottable ward, and perhaps an anti-apparation ward based on rune stones placed outside the vault.

Bill, on the other hand, learned everything he knew about warding through curse breaking in Egypt. The Ancient Egyptians held "cursed tomb" to a higher level of expected quality than subsequent civilizations, to the point that those multi-millenial ward schemes were still killing people today almost as effectively as they had two or even three thousand years previous. As a part of curse breaking, one had to learn the warding schemes inside and out until they were second nature. A common practice tactic was for older curse breakers to ward up "dummy tombs" for the younger ones to practice on. They didn't pull any punches, and there had been a number of fatalities during dummy tomb exercises. Bill Weasley, though quite young for his profession, was chosen repeatedly to make those dummy tombs.

Bill did not rely on outlying runestones to anchor the wards, in opposition to the more traditional British ward style. He instead used the structure of the Vault itself as the anchor, much like the architects and warders of the Pharaohs had done with the pyramids. He chose to inscribe the runes on vital objects, such as support columns and installed furniture that was permanently bolted down. More than once he covered up his runic arrays with the propaganda posters displayed in various parts of the vault.

For the wards themselves, Bill did not choose simple misdirection, but made things much more vicious. Apparation, for example, would be a very bad idea for both entrance and exit to the vault. He set up a special plague ward on the outer doors that was locked to intent, so that anyone attempting to gain entrance for the purpose of harming those inside would become deathly ill in an instant. If they left quickly their health would return. If they returned a second time with intent to do harm, there was no cure. Inside, he set up things for longevity and preservation, which would work towards keeping the muggle machines functioning without replacement parts for some time. There would be no issue of water purification chip failure in _this_ vault.

When he came to the entertainment facilities, his plans changed. These facilities, which seemed to consist of several rooms each two to three times the size of the Great Hall, were set under bulbs that did their best to mimic real sunlight. While not was warm or bright, they gave off light that was perfect for photosynthesis which is why the vault designers chose real grass for the rooms. Each room had about two meters of soil with a layer of sod on top. It was just seeding now, but it would be impressive once it grew.

"I wonder what this place is for," Bill, the pureblood wizard, asked out loud. With his upbringing Bill did not recognize a football pitch when he saw it. "It's long enough, but not tall enough for Quidditch, and there aren't any bleachers. Must be a garden." He glanced at the walls of the first room. "Good time to try out that plant fertilizing ward I learned in the Hanging Gardens when I took that trip to the Fertile Crescent."

Thinking he was doing a good deed, Bill inscribed a ward scheme on the room that had not been on the Hanging Gardens of Babylon as he believed, (Bill did not speak the local tongue with any proficiency), but in the gardens and temples of the Goddess Ishtar on the other side of the street. While it would improve plant growth and prosperity in the rooms, the fertility ward wasn't limited to plants.

He finished up after two days of steady work, with only brief breaks for personal needs and a good night's sleep. He left Vault UK-13 as the sun was ducking under the horizon, and cast a few spells to ensure the wards activated as soon as the vault door shut. Satisfied with his work, he set off to his London flat for a brew and a night in a warm bed.


	6. Chapter 6

.

.

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter 6**

* * *

"So, you've got everything packed into those little tiny pouches?" Helen Granger asked her daughter.

"Yep!" Hermione said gleefully. They had packed everything, even the furniture, into the tents, then Penelope shrunk the tents and they stashed them into the pouches. All that were left out were a few mugs, plates, a fork, knife and spoon each, a mattress each, and a lamp the Grangers had received as a wedding present and never liked, but kept out because it was given to them by Mr. Granger's annoying, needy aunt.

"Hermione, can we sit down?" Helen asked.

"Sure," Hermione said.

"It's only a few days before we leave for the vaults and we, I wanted to talk to you about the future," Helen explained. She paused, trying to figure out exactly how to say what she wanted to communicate. "Hermione, your father and I, we love you. Never forget that."

"I know. I love you both as well," Hermione responded quickly.

"But this could very well be the last week we'll ever see each other face to face," Helen went on to say. "We know that on some level, you're thinking of having children and while we'd love to get to know them..." She trailed off, choking back a sob. "It's just-It's we haven't seen you much these last few years. And now we're never going to see you again. I'm concerned. Really concerned about the future."

"It's not easy for me," Hermione admitted. "I've been trying not to think of it, but it's worried me too." She pulled her mother into a hug. A moment later, Menelaus wrapped his arms around them both. After a little while, they broke apart. Hermione, after wiping the tears from her eyes, gave both her parents an impish smile. "If you want we could still smuggle you into our vault?"

"You've got so many people and things, is there even room for us?" Menelaus asked with a chuckle.

"There's always room for my parents," Hermione said. "I don't know why Vault-Tech split us up. Maybe it was based on a lottery or maybe there wasn't enough room in one vault so we got split up. I don't really care. I know we can magic you out of your vault and smuggle you into ours. These past few months it's been you, me, Harry and lately Penelope as well. I'm missing Ron, but it's been really great being here with you."

Both elder Grangers looked at each other and seemed to communicate without a word passing between them.

"Are you sure it's safe for non-magic people?" Menelaus asked. Hermione paused, thinking it over.

"I don't know," she admitted, suddenly depressed. "If I'd been looking for a solution earlier then-"

"Then you wouldn't be packed for the great vault bootlegging caper," Helen said. "You had to make a choice, so you looked towards making the future better. We're proud of you for that."

"If it's not safe, if you're not sure it's safe," Menelaus said, "then perhaps we should not-"

"Actually, Mr. Granger," said an old man behind them. The Grangers turned to see Ollivander standing on the front step. "There's little cause for you to worry. The methods involved should pose no issue to you based on possession of magic."

"Mr. Ollivander!" Hermione exclaimed. "I didn't know if you were going to make it."

"I assure you, my dear, that I have every intention of carrying through with my end of the plan," the old wandmaker replied. "And to your parents, there should be no reason to worry."

"But if anyone rejects a vault ticket, the whole family is rejected," Hermione protested.

"Polyjuice potion, my dear girl," Ollivander replied with a kind, grandfatherly smile. Ironically, it would have been easier to simply change the photo on the card, but wizards, as usual, made things more difficult than they had to be. "And before you protest about brewing time, it's a simple matter to purchase a couple hours worth. There's a bit of an entertainment market built up around it."

"What is this potion?" Helen asked.

"It's a potion that transforms you into a copy of a person," Hermione explained. "I made it in second year."

"Quite an accomplishment," the old wizard commented. He turned to the Grangers. "May I come in? I could continue to stand on the step, but I fear I'm holding up the line."

"Line?" Menelaus asked, leaning to look out behind the man only to see a crowd of people waiting. "Who?"

Hermione ran to the door and broke out into a wide grin. "Ron! Neville! Everybody! Come in, come in!"

Wizards and witches entered the nearly empty house.

"Sorry, almost everything is packed away," Helen explained nervously. Hermione had already pulled the redheaded boy into a hug and turned to give the other boy a hug. Helen Granger nodded to the strangers and smiled to a familiar face. "Professor McGonagall."

"Hello, Mrs. Granger," the matronly professor said with a warm smile. "Hello, Hermione."

"Hello, Professor," Hermione greeted.

"Oh, Hermione, dear, we knew we had to have a party," Molly Weasley said, carrying a cog shaped cake covered in black frosting. "Bill said the vault door looked like a clock gear, so I did my best."

"I'm sure it's great," Hermione said.

"Wait, where's Harry?" Molly asked.

"I'll go get him," Hermione said, running upstairs. She burst into his room without knocking. "Harry! Everybody's here! It's a party!"

Then she realized Harry was in the process of pulling up his trousers and had yet to put on a shirt. Both of them turned Gryffindor red.

"Sorry!" Hermione said.

"I'll be down soon," Harry called through the door.

"Abs -I mean - _great_! I'll be down stairs," Hermione said, rushing back down stairs. "He'll be here in a bit."

The party was fun, a perfect distraction for the future vault dwellers. For the first time Hermione and Harry got to meet classmates' parents and siblings. Mrs. Weasley's cake was a treat and the professors were happy to summon up enough dishes for everyone. The Weasley Twins sang songs and showed off a few pranks from their proposed shop. Ron regaled his best friends of the Chudley Canons latest streak with a codifier that it was sure to get better soon.

"Molly, if you don't mind me asking," Helen said to the large woman. "Why did your family decide not to join Harry and Hermione in the vault?"

Molly had a look of sadness on her face.

"I know you trust your muggle machines and tekkynolgy," Molly replied with Helen refraining from correcting her, "but I just can't help but worry. They're my boys and my little girl. I just don't know what I'd do if they were off somewhere else."

"But what about their safety?" Helen asked as she sliced another piece of cake and slid it onto a plate.

"Arthur and a few others have been doing some reading and they've decided to make a sort of magic vault," Molly said.

"You mean the work at Hogwarts?" Helen asked. Molly jumped slightly in surprise.

"Oh, you know about that?"

Helen nodded.

"Professor Dumbledore took us to see the castle when he had Harry open the door to the Chamber of Secrets," Helen explained.

"Well, I suppose it's not _too_ secret, then," Molly admitted with a small grin at the pun. "It's not as fancy as what Bill said those muggle vaults are like, but it's Hogwarts. It's our... I'm not sure how to explain. I mean... we can't lose it. It just-"

"It's a symbol," Helen said in understanding. "It's where most of your met your spouses, where you learned, and where you grew up."

"It's more than that," Molly Weasley argued. "It's been standing for over a thousand years, continuously occupied. Without Hogwarts, there wouldn't be a Wizarding World. Not as we know it, at least. Everything else came later, the ministry, the Wizengamot. We've legends of things older, but just legends. Hogwarts is... well, Hogwarts _is_ our history and we always thought it would be our future as well."

"I think I understand," Helen agreed tentatively. "And you don't want to deprive your children of it?"

"Well, yes," Molly replied. "And it's much bigger than it seems. There used to be twice as many students in times past. Before the Last War and the Grindlewald War before that. I just see it as Hogwarts needing us as much as we need it."

"But do people know about the changes?" Helen asked.

"Well, the important people do," Molly said, glancing at Dumbledore, her husband and a few other people Helen didn't recognize.

"I hope it works for you," Helen said honestly.

"So do I," Molly admitted. "I worry. I worry a lot. This radishing thing, it just seems so unreal."

"Do you mean 'radiation'?" Helen asked. Molly nodded. Helen gave her a rueful smile. "That's much the same way Menelaus and I feel about magic. We know it exists, we can see the results, especially since Penelope has been staying with us, but it's very much outside of our experience."

"I suppose we're not so different after all," Molly admitted with a sad smile.

"I suppose not."

* * *

"Ron," Harry said. "I'm going to miss you."

"Me, too, mate," the redhead agreed. "But at least we've got the mirrors, right?"

"Yeah," Harry said. "We'll talk a lot."

"Yeah, we will," Ron said, a little uncomfortable at saying goodbye. They stared at each other for a while, not sure at what to say. Harry wondered how to say goodbye to his first friend. Hermione rolled her eyes and pulled them both into a hug. Harry stiffened in surprise, but eventually returned the hug with an arm around both his friends. Ron gave his little half smirk and hugged his shorter friends close.

"Who knows, maybe we'll see each other again?" Harry said. "After all, we'll be leaving the vault as soon as it's safe on the surface again."

"You're bloody well right we will!" Ron said, earning a little, halfhearted slap from Hermione.

"Language, Ronald," she chided, prompting the trio to burst into laughter.

"Really, it's time for me to go," Ron said sadly. "Take care of each other."

"We will," Harry said, giving both his friends a squeeze on the shoulder. "And we'll talk."

"Yeah," Ron agreed. "We will."

The rest of the Weasleys left and Neville and his grandmother walked up to meet them.

"Neville," Harry said. "I guess this is goodbye, too."

"No, actually, it is not," the Longbottom matron replied in a serious tone. "Due to my work in the Wizengamot, and the return of a certain dark wizard, Neville is in particular danger. He will be joining you in the vault."

"Neville? That's great!" Harry said, getting a half grin from the boy, it didn't reach his eyes. "Neville, what's wrong?"

"Gran and Uncle Algie aren't coming with me," he admitted. Harry and all three Grangers looked up to the older woman in confusion. She looked pained, refusing to meet their gaze.

"I cannot," she said. "Neville has a future before him. A great future, I'm sure. I'm old and quite frankly, I consider it a sin for a mother to outlive her child." The four future vault dwellers looked to her in confusion. She sighed and looked sadly at her grandson. "You never told them did, you Neville?"

"No, Gran," he admitted. He turned to Harry and Hermione and glanced away. "My parents are in the long term spell-damage ward at St. Mungo's. They were cursed in the last war, well, just after the last war technically." He looked pointedly at Harry's scar, then flinched away when Harry reached up to touch it.

"Bellatrix LaStrange, her husband, brother-in-law and Barty Crouch Jr." the elderly Longbottom explained. "For some insane reason they thought my Frank and Alice, Neville's dear mother, knew the location of that monster they followed. They were caught, but it was too late for my son and his wife."

"But if V-vol- If Voldemort's back it means I'm as much a target as you, Harry, because Bellatrix isn't going to take this lying down," Neville replied. "And with Malfoy free..."

"He might take to kidnapping or worse to get support in the Wizengamot," his grandmother finished for him. "My Neville won't be traveling with you, but your idea has spread with those willing to see the truth, Miss Granger. And your letter, while perhaps not as well received as you may have liked, did garner some attention, Mr. Potter. Mr. Granger, Mrs. Granger, you should be proud of your daughter. Her actions, intended or not, will save a number of lives regardless of if the muggles are right."

"We _are_ proud of her," Menelaus stated. Hermione beamed up at her father, who gave her a comforting half-hug.

"Well, then, Neville and I have a family visit to make before the final preparations," Matron Longbottom announced.

"Bye, Harry, Hermione. Oh, and Harry," Neville said. "Happy birthday, I know it's early, but..."

"Oh, right, and Happy birthday too," Harry said, remembering that Neville was only a day older than he was.

"Thanks," Neville said. "I'll see you in a few days."

"Yeah," Harry said. Their housemate waved a little as he and his grandmother walked down the front step and into the street.

"Don't fret, Harry," Dumbledore said. "It's for the best."

"I know, it's just..."

"Change is many things, Harry," Dumbledore. "Difficult on occasion, trying at times, but change is also a constant. We must adapt to meet the needs of the future. So far, you've proven yourself quite capable of adaptation."

"I never thought I'd hear a wizard paraphrasing Darwin," Helen Granger commented with a grin.

"Amazing book 'Origin of Species' I think," Dumbledore said. "A bit before my time, but it's now been around long enough for magical naturalists to take it into account. Although with Hagrid's experiments, it's difficult to see how they will achieve fitness."

"Personally I hope blast-ended skrewts never become feral, Professor," Hermione admitted. "They're not what I'd call safe."

"Perhaps not, but once cannot unmake the past," Dumbledore replied. He turned to hand Harry a large box. "Harry, this is the key to Hogwarts."

"Me? Why?" the boy asked.

"While Hogwarts is being arranged for protection against radiation, unfortunately, we do not yet have a charm to detect its presence," Dumbledore admitted. "You, on the other hand, are in a situation to know when it is safe to leave the protection of our bunkers. I'm giving you this key, the _only_ key, that will open the gates of Hogwarts after they are closed from the inside. It will trigger the locks on other bunkers as well."

"What if it's a long time?" Hermione asked.

"In that case, it will be up to Harry's progeny to complete the task," Dumbledore said. "We cannot trust the Ministry, as they feel there is danger from neither the muggles nor Voldemort. Most adults we know will either be joining us inside Hogwarts or are untrustworthy since their allegiance is to either untrustworthy faction. If the muggles are right, many of those who might prove trustworthy might also be dead. Harry, on the other hand, you will be safe."

"Are you sure?" Harry asked.

"Yes, Harry," Professor McGonagall said, with Flitwick, Sprout and other Hogwarts professors nodding in agreement. "We've discussed this at length. You are the best choice."

"That's a lot of responsibility to dump on a teen," Menelaus criticized, with Helen nodding in agreement.

"It is," Dumbledore agreed. "Though, if we're right, Harry will no longer be a teen when it is time to be used."

"True," Helen admitted.

"Okay, I'll do it," Harry said, opening the box. It was a large iron key with a red ribbon large enough for Harry to wear around his neck. He leaned down and slipped it over his head.

"I also gave the ribbon a few enchantments to hide it from prying eyes," Dumbledore said with a twinkle. He flicked his wand and numbers appeared before him. "It is getting late and I fear I have meetings to attend. Until we meet again, Harry, Hermione."

"Until then," Harry said. Hermione pulled McGonagall into a hug that make the older witch blush in surprise. Harry shook Flitwick's hand.

"Harry, don't give up your studies," he said. "You have a gift for charms. Use it."

"I will," Harry said. The small man turned to Hermione and made a similar declaration.

"I promise," Hermione said with a blush.

"Mr. Potter, Miss Granger," Sprout said. "I've given Neville and Susan Bones my collection of seeds and seedlings. While I know herbology isn't your favorite subject, you've both done well, please help them out."

"We will," Hermione agreed.

The other professors gave their goodbyes and a bit of advice. "Keep reading," Professor Vector told them. "You've got my studies and my favorite texts. Don't slack off now, and teach Mr. Potter a bit about true magic."

Hermione grinned and flashed Harry a smirk. "I will."

"I know astronomy will be difficult living underground, but in that chest are my best skycharts and books on sky magic," Aurora Sinistra told them. "No matter how long you're in there, don't forget to think to the sky. Especially you, Mr. Potter. Since you like the sky so much."

The professors finally finished and started to leave. "No professor Snape?" Harry asked, not that he was particularly upset at the man skipping the party. Somehow "party" and "Snape" just didn't seem to jive in Harry's mind.

"He had some important tasks to complete, so unfortunately he was unable to attend," Dumbledore explained.

"Ah," Harry said.

"Goodby Harry," Dumbledore said as the teachers all grabbed onto a rope portkey. "Or perhaps I should say 'until we meet again'?"

"Until we meet again," Hermione said with a firm nod.

"Portus!" Dumbledore said, and the professors were gone.

The Grangers, Harry and Penelope, along with Mr. Ollivander were alone in the house once more.

"So, what say you? Shall I just clean up quick?" the old man said with a wry grin, pulling out his wand. They glanced around the room and noticed it had become a bit of a mess with conjured furniture, abandoned plates and bits of food here and there.

"Thank you," Menelaus said tiredly. In an impressive bout of wandwork, the old man cleaned the room completely, vanishing all but the most comfortable chairs.

"Now, perhaps we can discuss how best to keep the Granger family together, hmm?"

* * *

"Rise, Severus Snape," hissed the man's master. Cloaked in black, the potions master stood up before the creature's throne.

"So..." Voldemort began. "Only a week until Potter is hidden underground like a filthy goblin."

"Yes, my lord," Snape replied. "Vault UK-13 in Dover."

"Ah, the White Cliffs of Dover," the creature hissed in amusement. "Ironic that the Light's poster-boy would be in such a place."

"Indeed, my Lord," the potion master agreed. "Quite ironic."

"Let us think of how best to make Mr. Potter's stay an enjoyable one," Voldemort said. He turned to one of his most well financed minions. "Lucius, what have your friends in the Ministry said about this?"

"They know that Potter sent out letters inviting people to join him, but so far as I know no one has taken him up on the offer," Lucius Malfoy replied. "It seems the Daily Prophet has done an excellent job at ruining his credentials."

"Yes, that was quite well done," Voldemort admitted. "And you had no hand in that?"

"No, my Lord, it was Delores Umbridge who created that scheme," Lucius replied. "Though I had plans to enact something similar if Fudge had reacted differently to your resurrection and empowerment."

"But he reacted exactly as you projected, an unwitting, yet willing tool," Voldemort commented. "A most valuable resource. Though I doubt if given proof, he would be so willing to follow your plans."

"So long as it is not his own eyes, he has washed away all proof given to him," Snape replied. "Even given proof, he refuses to believe in your return, My Lord."

"And he blames it all on the Black," Voldemort commented with a grin. He turned to his simpering minion. "Well done, Wormtail. Your greatest prank continues."

"Oh, thank you Lord Voldemort," Peter Pettigrew said quickly, holding a bottle of wine for his master. He poured as the snake creature lazily held his glass in a hand.

"Do we know who else has received these 'vault tickets' in the ministry?" Voldemort inquired from this throne before taking a sip of the deep red wine.

"I know only of the Tonks Family," Severus Snape replied.

"Ah, yes, the other Blood Traitor Black," Voldemort said with glee. "Lucius, how is your sister-in-law?"

"She works at St. Mungo's with her husband," Lucius replied. "She has not advanced in some time and remains on the middle level. Her mudblood husband, though he excelled at his OWLs and NEWTs, has not advanced past senior potion distributor." The death eaters laughed at the man's position. "Though both were skilled and well trained, my wife did not approve of her sister's choices and made steps to keep her from being a problem."

"Well done," Voldemort replied dryly, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I see that you at least managed to do something right when you were pretending, this past thirteen years." Lucius flinched at his master's tone, but was pleased when the creature did not curse him as he had done others who had failed. "We will leave the Tonks' for later. After all, there will be no place for them to hide." He took another sip. "Consolidate our position in the Ministry. I want a maximum of my Death Eaters in place to take over. Nothing overt, just scandal and greasing a few palms. Arrange for them to be in line for department heads, keeping Fudge's picks at the top as they are easily corrupted."

"It will be as you command, my master," Lucius answered with a bow.

"Severus, you know what I expect," Voldemort stated. "You have done well guiding more to the proper way of thinking in these years, much more than the rest of these simpering fools. While they played at politics, you taught my future army. Well done, Severus, well done."

"I live to serve," Snape replied with a bow, shooting a smirk at Lucius. The blond man struggled to keep his anger in check.

"Now, where is Crabbe?" Voldemort asked, not for the first time.

"We do not know," Lucius explained carefully. "He vanished the same day he was to purchase that book you requested. The same day my son and his friends were wrongfully incarcerated."

"I do not care about your spawn, Lucius," the snake creature hissed. "I want to know where Crabbe is. He is alive. I know this, but he has not arrived. Find out where he is."

Lucius bowed his head, chastised. "Yes, My Lord." Voldemort sneered at the blond before turning back to Snape.

"And what of the old fool's club?"

"They have decided to destroy the prophesy, My Lord," Snape said, knowing this would anger him.

"WHAT?" the creature's fury had an almost palpable presence in the room.

"Dumbledore has changed from pure defense to a bit of a blend of both, my Lord," Snape reported. "He has decided it is better to destroy resources than to risk them falling into your hands."

"Hmm... So the muggle loving fool wants to play hard ball, does he?" Voldemort said bemused. "This will be an interesting change." He turned to look at a middle age woman in healer's robes. "Merrill."

"Yes, My Lord?" She asked, stepping forward.

"Upon the second of august there will be an unfortunate failure of the disease containment at St. Mungo's," Voldemort instructed. The "healer" grinned madly.

"How unfortunate, My Lord," she said with that same wide grin.

"If only Healer Tonks had been more careful," Voldemort commented. "Such incompetence."

"Indeed, and to flee without telling anyone is so telling," Merrill noted. "And it is a shame that so many of the Wizengamot were infected."

"Precisely," Voldemort said he stood up so all his followers could view his majesty. "Ruin the reputations of Dumbledore's allies. Strike from the shadows. Blame them for mistakes of your creation. Break them apart, divide factions into fractions. Do so, all with my name in your hearts, but never on your lips."

"As you command," the Death Eaters said in unison, crossing their chests with their wands and bowing deeply enough to nearly kiss his feet.

"Rise, my Death Eaters," Voldemort said. "Rise and go forth to do my bidding."

* * *

"Are you ready?" Amelia Bones asked Susan. Tonks, Neville, Hannah Abbot and a number of other children of important light siding families were packed and ready to leave. They ranged in age from 5 at the youngest to 19 at the oldest.

"No, because you're foolishly sacrificing yourself for my safety," Susan told her aunt.

"Once a Hufflepuff, always a Hufflepuff," her aunt reminded her. "I have a responsibility to you and to all others I can save. If I must risk my life to do so, then I shall."

"Times like these make me understand the appeal of Gryffindor," Susan grumbled. Neville gave a little half laugh. She looked to him and smiled sadly. "Then we'd be excused for charging ahead and leaving the consequences for later."

"Yes, but we're not," Amelia replied. She gave Susan another hug and gently pushed her to the others. She stood up tall and looked at the assembled people. "This is not easy, and some would say it isn't right," she said. "But sometimes you go with what you have rather than what you want. We, as parents and guardians, want to keep you safe. Between Fudge, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and the threat these muggle bombs pose, we must hide you away in order to do so. It breaks our hearts, but having you in danger would break them worse."

"What about Hogwarts?" the eldest, a former Hufflepuff prefect, asked.

"Hogwarts is a different set of problems," Tonks explained. "While Dumbledore is doing his best, Fudge and his senior undersecretary refuse to believe the danger is real. Umbridge is to be forcibly inserted as the DADA professor. She is completely unqualified for the task unless one was to remove the "Defense Against" from the class description." There was a smattering of nervous chuckles. "The children of Death Eaters are there as well. Hogwarts, despite what many have said in the past, is not safe. We must therefore think of other ways to keep you safe."

"This vault is a muggle creation," Amelia admitted. "But that does not mean it is any less safe. If anything it is more so, since they know more about the threats these muggle bombs pose."

"And add to those protections the best of one of Gringott's best curse breakers could lay on it," Tonks explained. Parents and children alike visibly relaxed at the news. "He learned his trade in the hidden cities and tombs of Egypt and uses those same skills to protect us now."

"So there you have it, the best of both worlds," Amelia told them. "In a short time, you will enter the box, Auror Tonks has prepared. Inside is a small flat with the usual facilities. Those of you who have camped, will note this is very much like a magical tent. Once you are all inside, we will then shrink the box and disguise it as a pendant. This will not harm whoever is inside, but will prevent them from leaving until it is enlarged again. Everything you packed is already inside and there is enough food and water for a week for everyone here." she glanced over the group. "Once inside, she will allow you to leave the flat, though it may be fixed to a wall as a cabinet for later use."

"You should only be in the flat for a day, perhaps two," Amelia continued. "For those of you who are adults, while we ask that you please choose the vault, you are allowed to choose to stay. Please choose wisely. For the children and underage teens, we do this because we want you to be safe. I will give you two hours to say your goodbyes."

In the end, only two young men, fresh graduates of Hogwarts and Beauxbatons the previous spring, chose to stay with their families. All the other adult children chose the vault at the behest of their parents. As the sun set on July 31st the children gave their final goodbyes to their families and made their way into the cabinet. As soon as the last one was inside, Amelia locked the door and shrunk it so it fit into a specially made locket. It snapped in place and Tonks placed small photos of her paternal grandparents in each side. She hung it about her neck just as the sun sunk below the horizon.

"Take care of my girl," Madame Abbot told the young auror.

"I will," Tonks assured her. She repeated the sentiment to the other parents and guardians until only her boss was left. "Well, Director, I guess this is goodbye."

"Yes it is," Amelia said, struggling to keep up the stoic front she was known for. Haltingly, breaking her usual rules of fraternization with her subordinates, Amelia Bones pulled Nymphadora Tonks into a hug. "Be safe and keep them safe."

"I will," she said. "And trust Bill Weasley's work. He was chosen as a trainer curse breaker for a reason. And he got the position while still in possession of all his fingers and toes."

"That alone is a good recommendation," Amelia joked slightly. "I'm going to miss her."

"You won't have to worry so much," Tonks said. She reached into her pocket and handed the woman a mirror. "Two-way mirror. Well, much more than that now. The bird club has been making them for communication. I wanted you to have a way in. Susan doesn't have one, but I know the Grangers and Harry Potter do, as do I."

"Mobile communication at its finest," Amelia said holding the mirror in front of her. She smiled ruefully. "You know, until today I had a strict policy of no gifts since they almost always come with a hidden price. But this, well, thank you."

"You're welcome," Tonks replied. "It looks like I'm in the minority, since I'll have my parents in the same vault."

"Just because some families were broken up doesn't mean you should feel guilty about having yours close," Amelia replied.

"I suppose," Tonks said.

"One last thing," Amelia announced as she handed the young auror a ring. "Like the locket, but this contains emergency supplies. They're under stasis charms so long as they're in the ring, so use them only if something goes wrong."

"Thanks," Tonks said, slipping the ring on.

"And Auror Tonks?" Amelia asked before the young woman left.

"Yes?"

"Know that if this is a trick and you're really a very clever Death Eater, there is nowhere on the planet you could hide from my wrath," Amelia cautioned her.

"I'm not, but your warning is heard," Tonks said.

"Good."


	7. Chapter 7

.

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

Chapter Seven

.

* * *

"So, wait," the Grangers' next door neighbor said, sitting at the table. He was a doctor in his late 30s. "You're _giving_ us your vault tickets?"

"Can you even do that?" his wife asked, she a surgeon.

"We decided we didn't want to be separated from our daughter," Helen explained.

"And there was no reason for it to go to waste," Menelaus continued. "You're both good people. You've saved lives. There's no reason you should be left behind."

"It's just... you're giving up everything for us?" the wife asked.

"No," Helen said. "We're giving it up for our daughter. You just happen to benefit."

"But the tickets have your faces on them," the husband protested. Helen and Menelaus shared a bemused look.

"It's complicated, but there's a special medicine where you can match our appearance for a while," Helen said. "It lasts for about an hour. We'll give you two doses each, just remember to take the second one before the first runs out."

"This isn't a lot of time to decide," the husband commented. He looked to his wife for a moment. She looked back and together they took the cards.

"What is this medicine?" the doctor asked.

"It's similar to a stimpak," Menelaus replied, lying through his perfect teeth. "But fluid instead of a syringe. You take it orally."

"Is it safe?"

"My daughter knows the people who make it," Helen said. "She's used it herself."

"What do they teach at that exclusive boarding school of hers?" the husband asked.

"Well, you might as well call it magic," Menelaus said with a laugh, prompting their neighbors to chuckle. "Half the things she talks about we don't even understand and we're not exactly uneducated."

"Little Hermione always was precocious," the wife said with a smile.

"That she is," Helen agreed. She held out a small test tube holder with four capped vials. The contents swirled inside like clustered tornadoes. "This is the medication. I understand it tastes worse than it looks, but it works and it's safe."

"Humph," the doctor said. "It's like before stimpaks. All the meds tasted horrible if you didn't chase them with water."

"Actually, that's probably a good idea," Menelaus said. "Just remember, Tendring, Essex, Vault UK-14. Tomorrow. I'll give you the map."

"We could hardly miss Vault Day considering how much they've shown it on the telly," the surgeon said with a smile. She reached out and rested a hand on Helen's. "Are you sure?"

"Yes," Helen said with Menelaus nodding in agreement. "It's time for our family to come together."

The doctor gave his wife's hand a little squeeze. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Menelaus told them both. "You deserve it."

The doctor and surgeon thanked them once more and went back to their house. Helen and Menelaus slumped in relief.

"I can't believe that worked," Helen said.

"They're good people," Menelaus stated. "They deserve this."

"And we get to see Hermione fulltime again," Helen mused. "The benefits outweigh the risks."

"Indeed they do," her husband said. "So, time to visit the good Mister Ollivander, is it?"

"I think it is," she agreed. Taking his offered hand they walked into other room. "Everything all set?"

"Yes," Penelope assured her. "Mr. Ollivander is already inside his shop. Once you walk in, we'll shrink the entrance once more and store it in Hermione's pouch. Mr. Ollivander has already signed over ownership of his shop to your daughter so there should be no worry about her pulling it out again."

"Good," Menelaus said. "No offense to Ollivander, but I'm not too keen on spending the rest of my life in his shop."

"I doubt he is either," Penelope said with a small smile. She looked up at them. "Thank you for taking me in. You didn't have to, but..." she trailed off. "I don't have any close family. My mother was a chem addict and left me with my grandparents. They died five years ago in a car crash. I've been pretty much alone since then. This means a lot to me. It just-"

Menelaus shushed her and gave her a comforting hug. Helen wiped the tears away from her eyes.

"No need for tears today," Helen said. "It's only been a little more than a month, but you've become something like a niece. Hermione looks up to you, but as more than just an upperclassman or head girl. And I'm sure she's going to pick your brains as soon as we're in the vault and she can start using her wand again."

"She's already started. Picking my brain, I mean, not the wand," Penelope admitted. She looked up the stairs. "Hermione! It's time."

The bushy haired girl ran down the stairs with Harry at her heels.

"Ready?" she asked her parents.

"Yep, and the neighbors took our tickets," Helen said. "We'll see you tomorrow."

And with that, the Grangers walked through the odd door. Inside were Helen's parents, Menelaus's mother and step-father (his mother was a widow), Mr. Ollivander and a few other trusted magicals Penelope had rounded up.

"This is amazing technology, Helen," her father said as he looked around the shop. Helen rolled her eyes at her engineer father. "I knew Hermione was destined for great things, but this is amazing! And actual extradimensional space!"

Ollivander chuckled slightly. Some of the other magicals gave each other knowing glances.

"It's complicated, Dad," she said. "Let's pour a cup and we'll explain everything Hermione's been doing the past few years."

* * *

"Hey, pup," Sirius said as he crawled into Harry's window.

"Sirius?" Harry asked.

"And Remus," came a voice from outside. "If this mangy mutt will let me in."

"Hey, Sirius and Professor Lupin are here!" Harry called out, Hermione and Penelope running in just as Remus managed to swing one of his legs in the window.

"I'm no professor anymore, Harry," the man said. "Call me Moonie, or Remus if you must."

"Are you ready for us to smuggle you in?" Harry asked. Sirius and Remus shared a silent look. Harry's godfather ran a hand through his hair.

"No, we're here to say goodbye," Sirius admitted sadly.

"What?" Harry and Hermione blurted out.

"I said we're not joining you in the vault," Sirius clarified.

"Why?" Harry demanded.

"Because it's not safe to have a werewolf in an enclosed space like that," Remus explained. "Not for everyone else in there."

"But you're-"

He held up a hand to stop him.

"I can't take that chance," Remus said. "I've always been careful, either staying inside away from people or being locked up."

"Or with us," Sirius said, "the Marauders."

"Right," Remus explained. "I just can't take the chance. I've never bitten anyone as the wolf and I swear I never will. All it takes is some kid opening the door on the full moon to make things a complete disaster."

"And I'm going with him," Sirius said. Harry opened his mouth to protest, but his godfather stopped him by messing with his hair. "He needs someone to look after him. And I'm a wanted man still. And while I'll play the family pet as a joke, I won't live as one."

"But we've barely met!" Harry protested.

"I know," Sirius said. "It's something I regret every day of my life. But even without me you've turned into a great kid. Actually, you're probably a better kid than you would be if I'd raised you."

"We're proud of you, Harry. You too, Hermione. And you as well, Miss Clearwater, though I'm not sure why you're here," Remus said, trailing off.

"We found her in the book shop and she's got a ticket," Hermione clarified.

"When you say it like that it sounds like you bought me as a pet," Penelope commented, not quite sure how to feel about that.

"Right," Remus said. "Like I said, we're proud of you, and Harry, your parents would be proud of you and what you're doing right now."

"You didn't have to go out of your way to try and help people, to save people," Sirius said. "But you do. That's important."

"But nobody listened!" Harry protested.

"_Nobody_?" Remus asked with raised eyebrows, incredulity written plainly across his face. "Harry, Dumbledore's practically rebuilding Hogwarts on the off chance the muggles are right. There are people in the ministry working to do the same smuggling operation _you_ are because of what you and Hermione started. Harry, you sent out letters to the families of almost everyone in magical Britain, you can't say you didn't warn them. You even included evidence of the threat. It's not your fault that the few who responded didn't believe you."

Remus paused, gave him a friendly light punch to the arm and a grin. He turned to Hermione and smiled. "Hermione, you've saved a number of people, not just those you're smuggling in, but future generations." He looked at Penelope and paused. "And I'm sure you've done great things too, Miss Clearwater."

"Harry, as much as we'd like to join you," Sirius began.

"-We're needed out here," Remus finished.

"But-"

"If the muggles are wrong, we still need to worry about the Dark Wanker, Snake-face," Sirius said seriously. "We'll be out here doing our best to bring the war to him. And we can do that knowing you're both safe. er..." he paused and glanced at Penelope, who seemed quite bemused by it all. "I mean, all _three_ of you are safe."

The dog animagus looked at his godson with concern. "I'll miss you, pup."

"And I'll miss you, too," Harry said. "Both of you."

"So tell us what this vault is going to be like," Remus asked. Grins on their faces, worry temporarily swept aside, the three future Vault Dwellers explained everything they knew. They talked about the smuggling operation and everything they'd decided they couldn't live without. It was late by the time they finally broke up, saying their goodbyes and promising to talk on the mirrors daily.

"Harry," Sirius said after Hermione and Penelope had gone to their own rooms, giving the godfather and godson a few minutes alone. "One last thing."

"What is it?" Harry asked.

Sirius pulled a wrapped package out of somewhere. "Don't open it now. It's a few things that I wanted to make sure you had. Some were things your father gave me over the years, some are things I collected. Others are family heirlooms that I don't want falling into the wrong hands, namely my family. We had Bill take out any of the cursed items, but everything else should be safe. There are a few other bits and bobs. Take them for me."

"Don't you want these to-"

"Harry, I'm giving them to you because I think you'll need them or appreciate them more than I do these days," Sirius said. "You've had a hard life. Something you shouldn't have had. Just think of this as a few things you should have had all along."

"Thank you," Harry said. He grabbed his godfather in a tight hug. "I'm going to miss you."

"I'll miss you as well, but we'll be able to talk on the mirror," Sirius said, giving the boy a quick squeeze before letting go. "Just try to be a kid while you can."

"I'll try," Harry promised.

"Good," Sirius said, ruffling the boy's hair up.

* * *

Morning came as it always did: with the turning of the Earth. The sun rose and it looked like any other day. Harry woke first and slipped down to make breakfast for the three of them. It was quiet with only him awake, but he made sure to let the girls sleep as long as they could. Breakfast wasn't much, but Cram on toast was better than nothing, which was the only other option unless he wanted to go to the store.

Hermione woke to the smell of toast and... something. It had a vaguely meat smell, but the unpleasant metallic tinge it left in the air woke her up fully. She stretched, swung her legs out of bed and changed into her UK-13 jumpsuit. As expected, it fit perfectly. She hung her locket, which held most of the Granger's possessions, around her neck, tucked her wand into her sleeve and added both mokeskin pouches to the jumpsuit's belt. She felt them attach automatically with a sticking charm so they could be neither stolen nor lost. She jumped a bit to test it out and was pleased with the result. Opening one pouch, she carefully stuffed her favorite pajamas inside. With one last glance at the room, she nodded, satisfied she hadn't left anything behind.

Penelope Clearwater was the last to awaken, though it was a less pleasant awakening. Hermione jumping on the ceiling had been rather loud and a bit of dust shook down in her eyes. She vanished it and cleaned up the room. She too dressed in her vault jumpsuit, fixed her "five" personal items: two pouches, a favorite hair band, a family ring and her wand; then made her way down stairs.

"Hey," Harry said, handing the blond a plate.

"Thanks, Harry," Penelope said, sitting down next to Hermione. Harry shut off the fuel and took his portion of Cram-on-toast.

"There's water to drink," he told them.

"Thanks," Hermione said.

"Nervous?" Penelope asked.

"Completely," Hermione admitted.

"What do we say if they ask us if we've got contraband?" Penelope asked.

"We tell them the truth," Harry said cheekily. "That we're smuggling a shop, several families, twenty-four snowy owls, a goddess of owls named Hedwig (she might be able to hear me), 14 kneasles and a half kneazle/half wooly mammoth named Crookshanks."

"He's not that big," Hermione protested.

"Yes he is," Harry replied cheekily. Hermione rolled her eyes and brought them back to the subject.

"And the furniture, the personal items, the books and so on and so forth. I see now," Hermione said, understanding what Harry was getting at. "I don't have to lie. And more important, you don't, Harry."

"Me?"

"Yes, Mr. I-Couldn't-Lie-If-My-Life-Depended-On-It," Hermione replied slyly.

"They'll never believe us," Penelope commented. "Might think we're crazy, but they won't believe us."

"And that's the point," Harry explained. "The truth is more ridiculous than any lie we could come up with, so why lie?"

"Good point," Penelope said, setting her fork down. "Well, I'm done. How about you two?"

"I need to change, but other than that, I'm ready," Harry said. He stood up and walked upstairs.

"I'm ready," Hermione said, patting herself down to make sure she wasn't missing anything. Penelope did the same, then checked each other based off the paper checklist they'd made. Harry came back down and they checked him. Wand, three belt pouches and a holodisk. Everything was in its place.

"Time to go," Penelope said. She pulled out a sock Dumbledore had prepared for them and held it out for the other two to take hold of. With a grin they spoke the password: "Kessel Run!"

Apparently Albus Dumbledore had seen Star Wars.

* * *

The three future vault dwellers arrived in the bushes a short walk from Vault-Tech London. Others arrived by bus, train, taxi or their own vehicles. Everyone showed their tickets, were inspected for contraband and directed towards the buses headed to their particular vault. Harry, Hermione and Penelope said "goodbye" to Hermione's "parents" who had already taken the polyjuice potion, and boarded the bus to UK-13 in Dover.

"Is it just me or are there a lot more children than adults here?" Nymphadora asked her father.

"Not just you," he said. "Andy? What do you think?"

"I think this is so much better than the Knight Bus, but yes, there are far too many children," she said. "At least 7 to one if you include the teens."

"No elderly," Nymphadora observed. "Oldest appears to be...Dad."

"Thanks," her father replied dryly.

"You're not old, Dad, just the oldest here," she said with a roll of her eyes. "Take a bunch of five year olds and add a six year old, the six year old is still the oldest."

"Oh, so I'm a six year old, am I?" Ted asked.

"Yes, once again take my words and twist them," Nymphadora replied in a dry voice. "It's so funny. Please do it again."

"Potter's on board. Granger girl and the blonde from the bookshop," Andromeda reported, stretching her neck to see. "A few other familiar faces. Is that the Davis family? I wonder how many have chosen to transport themselves to the vaults?"

"Those closer to their new homes, I expect," Ted replied. "And yes, that does seem to be Mary and Elijah."

"I wouldn't have expected them here," Andromeda commented.

"Well, most people wouldn't expect Andromeda Black to be here either," Nymphadora put in.

"True, very true," her mother agreed. "But the road of life takes us to strange places." She waved to the boarding family. "Mary, Elijah!"

"Andy and Ted," Mary said with a wide smile. "Well, isn't this a surprise!"

"We were just saying the same," Ted agreed. "Of course, the whole situation is strange."

"Yes, indeed it is," Elijah agreed, sitting down on the other side of the isle from Ted. "Andy, did you have trouble with you not existing?"

She sighed and rolled her eyes. "Nearly too much to make this worth it. Pages and pages and pages. We needed to show photographs going back years to prove it. We needed to tweak Nymphadora's since she never looked the same in photo to photo."

"Same here, seemed so strange to see still photographs," the other pureblood replied with a grin. Ted and Mary chuckled while Tracy and Nymphadora sighed. "You know Tracy, right? And our little one?"

Mary held out her arms to show her infant sleeping with a soft cooing noise.

"Don't let him fool you, he's a noisy brat," she said with a smirk.

"All children are trouble," Ted said with a sly look at his daughter, breaking into laughter at her outrage. There was a lurch as the bus started forward.

"Everyone please sit down," a woman at the front asked in a cutie-baby voice. She was dressed in a vault tech jumpsuit like everyone else, but hers was white instead of blue. "We're about to get underway. Please close the windows and buckle your seatbelts. Thank you for joining Vault-Tech's British vault system. My name is Sally, and I'll be your Overseer's personal assistant in the vault."

"Overseer?" Hermione asked.

"Every vault has an overseer who tends to the upkeep and needs of the vault," Sally explained. "We chose the best Vault-Tech employees for the position and made sure he will meet your needs inside."

"If the Overseer's a 'he' he won't be meeting my needs," one jock up front heckled. "Can you fill in?"

Sally gave him a sideways glance, but refused to rise to the bait.

"The Overseer will meet us in Dover at Vault UK-13 with the rest of your fellow vault dwellers," Sally explained in a sweet voice. "He's eager to get things underway and looks forward to working with all of you."

Andromeda's eyes narrowed and her lips thinned. "I don't like the idea of an Overseer. They never said anything about that in the Informational."

"Makes you wonder what else they left out," Ted agreed in a low voice as Sally explained the Overseer's role in their lives.

"I just hope this is an improvement over Hogwarts," Tracy grumbled.

"Ah, half-blood in Slytherin, am I right?" Andromeda asked and gave a slightly pained smile at the girl's nod. "Not easy. Most have a hard time. Not as bad as muggleborns, but not easy."

"Muggleborns in Slytherin?" Tracy gasped.

"Rare, but they happen," her father said. "Even more rare that they graduate."

"It wasn't always that way," Andromeda replied. "Before Phineas Nigellus Black messed around with it as Headmaster it was not unknown, but not exactly common."

"Yes, grampy the hated headmaster," Nymphadora said in singsong.

"An ancestor we aren't exactly proud of," Andromeda agreed. "Scratch that, we aren't proud of him at all."

"Excuse me!" Sally called out in her cutie-baby voice. She pointed to the Tonks and Davis families. "I'm sorry, but I'm speaking now."

Andromeda Tonks, born Andromeda Black, the middle of the three Princesses of the Ancient and Most Noble House of Black, gave the young woman a glare that made Sally shiver despite herself. Then Andromeda gave her a rather fake smile and motioned for her to continue like a queen allowing a peasant to speak before her. The entire thing said "you exist at my sufferance."

"Yes, we should arrive in plenty of time for tea, so please relax and watch the video on your tellies," Sally finished, shooting nervous glances at Andromeda.

* * *

"OH DUDDERS I'M GOING TO MISS YOU FOREVER!" Petunia cried as she clung to her only son. They had arrived back in Surrey a week ago and were pleased that the Boy had taken the box they'd left on the table (filled with the remnants of Lily's existence and any photo that unfortunately included the Boy) and had found some place else to live. They had chosen their "five" items, but were much less skilled at smuggling than Hermione.

"Stand aside vault dweller," a Securitron commanded as it waved a detection device over Dudley. Still sobbing, Petunia stepped back. The Securitron held out a rubbish bin. "Deposit the chems you have hidden on you."

Dudley grumbled and dropped the Psycho he'd stashed in his pocket into the bin.

"Deposit the chems you have hidden on you."

"You horrid robot, don't you speak to my Dudders like that!" Petunia commanded.

"Stand aside Vault Dweller," the Securitron commanded to Petunia. "Dweller designate Dudley Dursley, if you do not deposit the chems you have hidden on you I will comply with my directive to use force."

It pulled out a gun. Dudley's eyes went wide and he started rifling through his pockets to drop 2 more Psychos, 4 Jets and 14 bottles of Buffout.

"Thank you for complying," it said rolling away.

"Damn freakish robots," his father grumbled. "Unnatural to take away a man's Buffout."

"I know Dad," Dudley moped.

"Be strong son," Vernon told the boy. "Don't take shite from anyone."

"Such language Vernon!" Petunia scolded.

"Sorry, Pet, but Dudley needs to stay strong," Vernon told her.

"Don't worry," Dudley said. "What about the freak? If he doesn't show up, won't they kick us out?"

"I saw the Boy board the bus to UK-13," Petunia replied, having spotted the Boy's unruly mop of hair with her unnaturally long neck. "We're perfectly safe."

"Those damn commies won't get us here!" Vernon declared.

"Damn straight!" Dudley agreed.

"Well, go on, son, board your bus."

He allowed his mother one last hug and rushed on board.

"A fine young man," Vernon told his wife. Petunia nodded as she wiped the tears from her eyes.

* * *

When the bus arrived in Dover (in plenty of time for tea), there was already a number of people cued up for entrance. As directed by Sally, they walked off the bus and stood in a second cue next to the first. The other buses did the same until there were a number of lines waiting.

"And here's our Overseer, Maximilian Barker," Sally said in her cutie-baby voice. She started clapping and looked a little annoyed when the vault dwellers didn't automatically start clapping. It started slow, but didn't really pick up that much before dying off fairly quickly.

"Welcome Vault Dwellers to Vault UK-13, your new home, protection against anything the communists can throw at us!" Barker announced in a loud voice. There was a small smattering of conversation that quietly continued. He did not seem pleased about that. "Please, starting on my left, my assistant will check your name and ticket against the list. Once your identity is verified you will be allowed into your new home."

* * *

In Essex, the doctor and the surgeon let out a deep breath as they made it into the vault with only minutes to spare. The vault door rolled shut and they were safe. The two of them excused themselves and went to the bathroom to let the "chems" wear off. There would be a bit of confusion when other didn't recognize the couple, but now that the door was closed it was a minor issue. They were safe.

* * *

In all of the vaults people found their assigned rooms and dropped off their personal items in the lockers provided. They then went to dinner in the cafeteria before listening to their respective Overseer talk about their vault.

At UK-13, they were just about ready to close the door when a man arrived without warning or exposition.

"My ticket," he stated, flashing it a Sally.

"You're really late," she said. "That's not nice Mr. Snape."

He sneered at her like he was looking at a slug, or a first year Gryffindor.

"You're not dressed right either, so you're going to have to toss out that weird black suit," she said in that irritating cutie-baby voice. Snape ignored the cameras pointed in his direction, pulled out his wand and flicked it.

"Confundus," he hissed. "I'm dressed perfectly fine, I've no contraband and you are an irritating twit of a muggle."

"Thank you for showing up, Mr. Snape," she said warmly in her befuddled state. His coat billowing out behind him, Severus Snape marched into Vault UK-13, not even pausing to watch the door close as Sally walked in behind him.

* * *

End First Arc.

Next: Enter the Vault


	8. Chapter 8

.

**Part 2 – Dwelling in the** **Vaults**

Chapter 8

.

* * *

The Vault System was never designed to save anyone.

This was just as true in the UK as it was in the US and Canada (having been recently annexed into the United States). The Vaults were a vast social experiment by those in power, nothing more, nothing less.

Like Vault UK-00 just outside Liverpool. This vault was designed as an experiment in social class. One half of the vault dwellers were drawn from the richest the British Isles had to offer, the other half from the poorest of the poor Britain had to offer. Then they were put inside with no clothes other than standard jumpsuits, no alcohol, no weapons, no books, no sports, no entertainment recordings. The only food was a thin nutrient gruel that came out of a spout.

Or Vault UK-10, which was populated completely by Shakespearean actors, but the only entertainment were holotapes of old American reality TV shows.

Vault UK-11 was populated half by hedonists and half by people who kept to a neo-Puritain lifestyle. Of all the vaults, this was the most successful and the biggest failure of the UK experiments.

In West Yorkshire, UK-01 was designed to test teamwork after a sudden cut off in supplies. 14 weeks after the vault door closed, luxury items started to break and the water started to only trickle from the taps. There were plenty of possibilities for people enterprising enough. There was a hidden hydroponics laboratory and a seed bank as well as many other resources if people were willing to look. The Overseer was instructed to hand out hints she received on her terminal in the most subtle of ways.

These were two examples of the experiments involved. Some were stranger, some rather normal. Not all these experiments went according to plan.

* * *

The original intent for Vault 16 was to explore the possibility of a clothing free society in the modern Britain. Otherwise, its layout, entertainment and all other facilities were the same as most other vaults. The Vault UK-16 jumpsuits were designed to break down when exposed to water. The first time they got wet, or were washed, there were no clothes.

Unfortunately, this is not what happened. Ambrose Wesleydale had been out walking in the moonlight as he tried to make a decision about his vault ticket. He didn't hear the bustle in the hedgerow next to him, nor did he note the dark shape that jumped out until it was too late. A creature, built like a heavy weight boxer with the head of a beast, sunk its jaws into the man's shoulder and shook him. Ambrose didn't really know what happened as he apparently passed out from the pain. He was rushed to the hospital and healed after some surgery and stimpaks. Later visits showed he had no infection or other side effects of his animal attack. His stitches removed three days before Vault Day, he cued up like everyone else, the attack having made his decision easy.

However, the muggle doctors were wrong.

Ambrose Wesleydale _was_ infected, just not with a virus.

Unbeknownst to him or the staff at Vault-Tech, the "animal" that had attacked him near his suburban home went by the name of Fenrir Greyback who had been recruiting for his master.

The vault door closed two days before the next full moon.

This experiment was a failure, but turned into another as eventually every human being became infected. There was a dip in population at first, but it quickly leveled off in the next few years as the werewolves mated in their bestial forms. The infection was passed onto the next generation. A number of generations later, it was normal to be a werewolf in UK-16.

* * *

Then there was Vault UK-08.

Dudley marched into his new vault determined to be the top boss in no time. He'd gotten a good look at the others and they were all wimps. He'd put them in their place. But first he had to see if the med center had any chems.

"Damn," he grumbled finding none of his favorites he was addicted to. Withdrawal would be a bitch, but maybe someone else had smuggled some in. Leaving the med center, he made his way to the cafeteria. The vault door was closed and the dwellers started serving themselves.

"Hey, has anyone seen the Overseer or the assistant?" one skinny guy asked.

"Not since we came inside," said another. "Did anyone check the office?"

"Yeah, but that was a while ago," a woman replied. "Probably around here somewhere."

Dudley Dursley didn't really care about any overseer as he was more focused on piling as much food on his plate as he could. They had everything from pudding to Dandy Boy Apples to pie. He took a bit of each and waddled to a table. He dug in, half focused on his food and half focused on becoming UK-08's boss, when the screaming started.

He looked up, then froze in fear.

Dudley would never admit to a fear. In fact, he'd beat up anyone who said that to his face. Unfortunately a visit to the Zoo when he was eleven had given him a particular phobia. One would think that it would claustrophobia, being stuck in a small display after his freak of a cousin trapped him inside. However, that wasn't a big deal.

His parents had been working for over an hour to convince the zoo security to let Dudley go. Dudley, always wanting to get his own way, had ditched them and started banging on the cages of the animals not suitable for display. This had disturbed a particularly ornery cobra that had jumped up and bit his hand.

Repeatedly.

They'd needed three packs of anti-venom to cure the bites and Dudley had been afraid of snakes ever since.

"Snakes!" one man growled/yelled. "Why does it always have to be snakes?"

Dudley screamed like he'd been retroactively turned into a choir boy.

Vault UK-08 was filled with rats, 47 non-poisonous snake species and 800 people with Ophidiophobia and thousands of rats. There was no Overseer to keep order, no management or security robots. Food was produced in artificial green houses that also served as incubators for snakes, the only source for healthy meat after the initial stores ran out. There were no weapons other than a person's fists or a makeshift club. All machines were serviced from a second hidden vault that had no access to the snake filled rooms. Video cameras recorded it all.

Unlike other vaults it was impossible open UK-08 from the inside. It would be forty years before anyone saw the sun again when the door opened on pre-programmed command.

* * *

Some of the UK vaults were longer term experiments.

Like UK-12, which appeared normal at first, but 15 months after the vault closed, all food was laced with Tetrahydrocannabinol. It was intended to stay shut for a minimum of 60 years. There was crap for entertainment in the vault, but after those fifteen months, they didn't really care. This would end up becoming a vault of artists whose creations only made sense when one was under the influence of a mind-altering chem.

The only vault that was actually completely successful was UK-12, because people were, like, you know, too chilled out to cause trouble and, like totally down with like the stuff, uh, you know the stuff. They were also, like dude, the happiest of the vaults, as somehow, like, everything became funny. Like the blank wall. Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

…

…

Walls.

...

Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

* * *

Or Vaults UK-03 and UK-04.

These two were built right next to each other in Cornwall, and were part of the same experiment. Each was occupied by a group of people with the same physical traits. Background was irrelevant, dwellers were chosen on similarity to each other in terms of hair, eye and skin color, height, weight, facial structure.

Dwellers of UK-03 had red hair, blue eyes and freckles with a focus on height in both, but with broad shoulders in men and an hourglass shape in women. UK-04 had black hair, beady green eyes, pale sickly skin, hooked noses and a short, sickly build in both sexes. After 75 years, the walls separating the two vaults would retract, suddenly letting the two groups mingle for the first time since the vault doors closed.

* * *

Petunia and Vernon Dursley were assigned to UK-09 situated in the far north of Scotland.

"See Pet? No problem at all," Vernon said as they sauntered through the well maintained cavern entrance. "And now we're going to live the good life. Mr. Handys to do the dishes and clean the clothes. The best Holotapes and feeds from Britain."

"I know, I'm just worried about Dudders," Petunia said as they walked in the vault door. Like the "normal" people they were, they followed the Overseer's directions to their quarters and settled in for the night.

At five AM the next mornings, klaxons woke up the dwellers and Securitrons forced people out of their rooms. They were herded into the central cafeteria where they were instructed to que up in four rows. Vernon nodded to a few people he'd seen in his position as an executive at Grunning's Drills. They were good men and women. Normal folk.

They, like the Dursleys, were grumbling about being woken in such a manner and at such an hour like common laborers.

On the platform above them, Securitrons escorted a man to the edge so he could look down upon them. He was built like a man who worked out, but used it, like a military man or an Olympian. His muscles were large, but not grotesque. His jumpsuit was black with yellow letters for the vault number as opposed to the rest of them who had worn the standard blue and yellow.

"I am your Overseer," the man said, slapping a hand with his police baton. "You have been chosen to serve this Vault. Work well, and you will be treated well. Work poorly, and you will be punished."

"What?" demanded Vernon. "Nobody said anything about work!"

"You think this was for _free_?" the Overseer demanded, staring down at them as if they were ants. "You think we were just handing out tickets _for free?_ No! You will work for your ticket. You will pay Vault-Tech and the Crown for their generosity." He nodded to the robots. "Securitrons, escort the workers to the fields."

The robots, each armed with their usual implements of war, herded the outraged vault dwellers into the artificial fields. Cows, chickens, pigs and crops filled the area. Hot bulbs designed to replicate the heat and full spectrum of the sun hung over head, and the Overseer stood above them all, lifted from the ground by a crane.

"Here is your food," the Overseer commanded waving a hand to encompass the entire farm. "If you want to eat, you must work."

"What? Are you insane?" bellowed a banker Vernon recognized, speaking words that most of the UK-09 dwellers agreed with.

"If you don't work, you don't eat," the Overseer finished.

"This has gone far enough! You can't treat me like this! I'm the CFO of the Central Bank!" he yelled out.

"You will pick up your tools and care for your food," the Overseer commanded. The robots handed out rakes, spades, hoes and pitchforks. The banker held the pitchfork in his hands, glaring at it as if he couldn't believe this was reality.

Snarling, he threw the tool at the robot, scratching the casing, but causing no injury. He looked up at the Overseer. "Fuck you! Take your filthy little robots and shove them up your arsehole!"

"So, you will not work?" the Overseer asked.

"Fuck no!" the banker declared, giving the man the New York passing signal.

"Then you will be punished," The Overseer declared darkly, motioning for the injured robot. It turned on its one wheel, took aim, and shredded the banker with bullets. The "normal folk" screamed and tried to get away, but the other Securitrons armed their weapons. "_That_ was punishment. The same will happen to any who refuse to work."

One by one, reluctantly, the bankers, corporate executives, heiresses and heirs, and otherwise entitled people started forward. They held the tools and tried to figure out how to use them as if there was some kind of magic "on" switch.

"Work harder!" their Overseer commanded.

Vernon Dursley, morbidly obese, slovenly self-important man that he was, tried to use a rake to move fresh cow manure. It would be months before he realized he really should have used a shovel.

Petunia, after picking up a hoe, realized she had no idea how to garden as she'd passed all the work off to the Boy. Her nephew would have known exactly what to do, goodness knows she gave him plenty of practice over the years.

A farm, Vault UK-09 had been designed as an experiment to see how people would function under circumstances that were mostly alien to them. The dwellers were chosen for their place in society and psychological profiles made at Vault-Tech. These people had no callused hands, no scars from hard work. The worst injuries were from playing too much golf or from spending too much time on the terminal. They had never worked a full day in their lives. They played around, joined all the right clubs and surrounded themselves with all the right people.

Not a one of them had actually seen a cow with their own eyes. They'd seen holotapes or bits on the Telly, but they couldn't tell you the difference between an ox or a steer or even a bull from a cow. Heaven help them when they had to tell the difference between layer hen and a meat pullet.

Vault UK-09 had no automated farm equipment. No tractors, no rototillers, no powered lawn mowers. All non-essential technology was stripped before it was populated, so there were no electronic communications, no computer terminals and no technical schematics outside of the engineering department (that none but the Overseer were aware of) and the Overseer's staff. All entertainment data is at least fifty years old at the closing of the vault and were all shows that were canceled mid-series.

Other than the basic technology of the kitchen, living quarters and power system, it was like being transported to the start of the Victorian Era. The people were made to work through forced labor, transforming the rich into serfs while the Overseer and his staff were the vault elites.

They were horrified at their situation, but they'd already seen what would happen if they fled.

* * *

Some vaults were truly bizarre experiments. UK-17 was populated by 970 very life-like wax sculptures and 15 couples of assorted ethnic and socioeconomic background.

There was a chemical in the wax models that had an unfortunate side effect of male infertility with frequent and/or long exposure. The loving couples became very close friends, but died of old age, childless. All that is left in the vault was the AI computer system designed by one couple, and the descendants of the original robots. It knew that it was supposed to look after the dwellers, but when the dwellers were gone, it had no purpose. With it's need to be full of people, it made them out of replacement parts, scavenged bits from broken down Mr. Handy's and Securitrons and all non-essential systems, like life support. These new androids were covered in wax for skin and flesh, dressed in vault jumpsuits and programmed to be true AI's like the "Overseer" who gave digital birth to them. They are "people" but they are not "human."

* * *

In Norfolk, UK-05 was comprised entirely of conjoined twins from all over the world. This vault would have one of the widest ranges of how they defined "beauty" of any society to come out of the vault system.

* * *

Then there was Vault UK-13.

Unlike the other vaults, this was based on genetics. Every single person who received a vault ticket had been under a genetic scan. They tested absolutely everyone who signed up for the vaults. However, they were only looking for some very specific traits.

It would be difficult to convince the Ministry of Magic, but a large part of the Statute of Secrecy had been useless for some time. Britain had installed CCTVs around the nation decades before. Records were kept on computer terminals instead of on paper or in a person's head. Without the proper knowledge, one couldn't simply erase data from a computer and an _obliviate_ certainly wouldn't do it. Even if they did know how, the hardcopies of CCTV feeds were hidden in undisclosed locations. In fact, the recorder of CCTV feeds might not even be in the same county as the camera.

Basically, the Statute of Secrecy was blown wide open in muggle populated areas.

Muggleborn and muggle raised children were observed during accidental magic.

Ministry Obliviators were observed attempting to erase the events from the public.

The occasional Death Eater nostalgia revel was seen. They were seen using spells to cause pain or control a person's actions. They were seen murdering in cold blood. Unfortunately, by the time police arrived, they always escaped, usually by some form of teleportation.

Any time a magical was in the muggle world, they were being observed.

Vault-Tech, on the other hand, did not know the secret of magic. The Home Office, aware of the magical world, had manipulated things so that Vault-Tech was unaware of the second Britain, but still gave them the data they needed. They simply observed people with special powers they classified as "psychic abilities."

In the US, Vault-Tech was controlled by an organization known as the Enclave, a subset of the US Government that had little care about the ideals the US had been created under and still claimed to respect. Vault-Tech built, staffed and stocked each vault to the specification of the Enclave's experiments. In the UK, they were directed by Her Majesty's Government and enacted similar experiments at the prime minister's behest.

The Prime Minister had a problem. It was a problem of a nation that existed on the same soil as Britain, but was neither subject to nor respected the laws of Britain. After the events of Grindlewald and the self-styled "Lord Voldemort" it was the opinion of Her Majesty's Government that the Wizarding World was a detriment. However, many flaws can be turned into assets under the correct circumstances. Short of bombing the general location of Hogwarts and the block "Diagon Alley" was known to exist, there was little Her Majesty's Government could do about the problem.

Vault UK-13 was the solution.

Observation was first.

Children who were observed with accidental magic were flagged in the system. It was noted that many of them would vanish for months at a time from September to June and would talk about a place called "Hogwarts." It was ostensibly a school, not that such an institution was registered with Her Majesty's Government, and eventually almost all of those children went off the grid by the time they reached the age of seventeen, only occasionally returning to visit family, though most left completely.

The second stage was to gather a genetic map.

These children had blood drawn during school physicals and other medical visits. They had blood taken later before the vault tickets were issued. Eventually, after years of research, the muggles had traced the genetics of magic. It was a series of dominant and dormant genes that had to match up a certain way, otherwise magic was impossible. If a family had magical children at all, it was common for only one such child in a family because of the rarity of the magical genes in the common population.

There were genes that determined magical power and special traits. Some, like in Subject Harry Potter, showed a link to multiple traits for the same genes. His eye color, a vibrant green that was exceedingly rare in the non-magical population, was caused by the same gene that also gave him increased magical power.

With these traits mapped and logged, it was possible to recruit a population of individuals who possessed magic, but were not subject to the whims of the Wizarding World. They selected primarily children not yet indoctrinated. A number of selected teens who were reported to attend "Hogwarts" or "Beauxbatons" were also chosen because they had skills and knowledge that could be passed down. Only a very few adults over the age of twenty were chosen to limit the attachment to the magical world.

The third phase was Guilt.

Guilt is a powerful motivator. Gossips like Petunia Dursley use it to manipulate others into conformity. Those in authority use it to motivate those below them. Parents use it to enforce behavior in children. For the most part, humans do not want to feel guilt. Thus it was easy enough to "guilt" many of the children into attending UK-13.

All it took was for Vault-Tech, in the nicest way, to tell the children "Join the vault or your entire family dies." Every family with a magical child considered suitable for the program also received vault tickets. The parents, not wanting to die, would pressure their children into the vaults, while the children would be more willing because they didn't want their parents to die either.

Most parents were shuttled to other vaults, never to see their children again. The few non-magical parents who were allowed into UK-13 were those genetically most likely to have magical children.

Of course, to get the right sample size for the project they imported as many muggleborn children as they could. There were some from the US, a number from France and Ireland, quite a few from Norway, Denmark and Sweden, all nations that also had contracts with Vault-Tech and large refugee populations fleeing the Great War in Asia and the Resource War in Europe. The children were not informed that they would be in the UK until their buses boarded ferries or entered the Chunnel.

Still, even with these imported children and teens they were able to acquire only 453 dwellers, much less than the normal 1000. Unfortunately, the result was a child to adult and teen ratio of 10 to 1. For adults and teens, women out numbered the men almost 5 to one, though it was approximately 53:50 female to male for the vault as a whole. This was attributed to strict recruitment and drafting into the military, and a number of those men who would have normally qualified, died in combat.

Of course, that many children would be difficult for most people to deal with, so the adult population was supplemented by Mr. Handy units programmed to deal with children. Auto-Docs were programmed with the latest in pre- and post-natal care with a lesser emphasis on adult medicine, though they were by no means deficient in that capacity. Vault-Tech installed an extensive database on medical techniques with a focus on pediatrics, and a large collection of medical training supplies as well as an overabundance of stimpaks. After construction, the medical facilities were three times the size of the same in a "normal" vault.

The habitation section was designed with a focus on cohabitation. There was very little privacy at all. The beds were designed for two or more people and there were a third as many as there were people. Most rooms had several beds in the same room, no door and only shelves for storage space. Those few rooms that were fortunate enough to have doors could only be locked by order of the Overseer.

UK-13 had the most extensive recreational facilities of any vault in Britain or Ireland, making use of the less space used in adult and teen sleeping areas. A large track was paved around an Olympic length swimming pool that extended to a depth to 50 meters at its deepest point where their was a higher ceiling to accommodate diving. To the side was built a smaller "kiddy pool" only a maximum of 1.5 m deep on one end, though it was still quite long, allowing for one to make laps, but not designed for diving. A real grass field under grow lights and drip irrigation had sections marked for soccer (as Vault-Tech was still an American company), field hockey, cricket and other outdoor sports. A specially designed robot kept the grass perfect in length and quality at all times.

Vault-Tech supplied plenty of sports equipment for various field sports from football to rugby to track and field to fencing. There were two archery ranges and a room filled with treadmills, exercise bikes and weightlifting equipment. Each vault dweller was given a martial arts uniform in addition to their regulation jumpsuits for the mandatory self-defense lessons. In the interests of the vault's preservation if attacked, three individuals known as "Squibs" were included both for lack of antipathy towards magicals and their martial arts background with strict insistence on self defense and self control. However, outside of sports and martial arts, there were no weapons in the vault.

The last thing they wanted was for this experiment to fail because someone decided to see if they could kill witches with firearms and plasma weapons. With this in mind, even the Securitrons were equipped with solely non-lethal weapons. While highly regulated and rather rare in the UK anyway, almost every other vault had at least a few weapons, or designs that allowed them to build a few.

It also had one of the most extensive science libraries in the international Vault system. Vault-Tech included a plethora of books, informational files and physical resources such as pencils, paper, clipboards, far exceeding the needs of the population. The educational quarter was designed to be quite large, much larger than necessary for the initial population size. The Prime Minister insisted on a greater emphasis on ethics, genetics and bioscience which resulted in a full genetic laboratory, an advanced hydroponics laboratory, a cloning department, and medical training. Other sciences had similar laboratories, though they tended to be smaller and not as well stocked. Other fields covered were history, ethics, computers, mathematics, anthropology and sociology, chemistry, and art (which was second in emphasis only to bioscience).

As the goal of UK-13 was a more British and Loyal magical public it was decided to limit possible aggressors and ensure the dwellers' allegiance to the Crown.

The Overseer of UK-13 was chosen to be hyper nationalistic, a proud British citizen and subject of the Crown. The entertainment video files were 90% pro-British propaganda; the rest were romances or porn. The walls were covered with signs declaring how proud the people of Britain were that the Dwellers of UK-13 were good British citizens.

Aside from the science section, books were mostly "true British Classics" selected to show the best of British arts and culture, this meant Shakespeare, Dickens, and such for the big names. Byron and both Shelleys had large sections. Robert Burns complete works were included in several forms. The greatest of English, Welsh, and Scottish artists were included with framed prints made specially for the vault.

Modern language was restricted to the Queen's English, save for some specific texts on Gaelic and Welsh. The PM insisted on including Ancient Latin and Greek because they were important to a "well rounded" education, though it was really just because those in power knew many spells had Latin and or Greek roots, unbeknownst to Vault-Tech.

Why did Her Majesty's Government spend so much time and effort on this when the communists could bomb them at any time?

Because Her Majesty's Government never believed the bombs would really fall.

Sure, the news talked the war up, but no one would really be stupid enough to actually start a nuclear war, right? Not one government involved in the Vault system believed there could be someone stupid, but like any fight, someone has to throw the first punch. Vault-Tech held the same beliefs and acted as the arm of the governments responsible for the Vault Experiments.

They fully expected the world to keep on going with the people sealed inside completely ignorant of reality until it was time for the experiment to end. Eventually, they'd release the descendants of the vaults, observe the results, and most likely, start new ones based on what they learned.

This was all well and good, but there's an old saying: "No plan survives the enemy." Because the Vaults were never intended to save anyone.


	9. Chapter 9

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter Nine**

**Part 2: Vault Life**

* * *

Vault-Tech didn't know it, but UK-13's enemy was Hermione Granger along with anyone else with half a brain and a wand.

Everything was supposed to be perfectly planned out.

Maximilian Barker, the UK-13 Overseer was to be the Crown's hand in guiding the magical vault dwellers towards hypernationalism. He had been a mid-level Vault-Tech manager and was chosen because he was apparently easily swayed into what the Crown and Vault-Tech wanted him to do.

He was large, quite round, and not jovial enough to pull off the young Santa look. His hair was straight and brown, combed over to the side; his face clean shaven. He gave the impression that he loved being in power, but became quite flustered when challenged or things did not go according to plan, yet was quite the sycophant to those he considered his superiors, like Vault-Tech executives and the representatives of Her Majesty's Government.

Basically he was to be the love child of Vernon Dursley and Cornelius Fudge, inheriting the bad habits of each. Or so his employers thought.

The truth was a bit different. He was quite strict, proud of his position, but willing to adapt when his chosen path was proven difficult to follow. Situations always changed and since Vault-Tech was looking for a nationalistic sycophant for a vault overseer, he managed to become a nationalistic sycophant and got the position of vault overseer. If he needed to change to stay in power, he would do so. He would change, he would adapt. In the modern workplace, he was Darwinian, the fittest for the management ecosystem.

While Sally was quite skilled as a personal assistant, it was clear she was chosen for her large mammary glands, wide blue eyes and natural platinum blonde hair and a reputation for flexibility in both body and morals. While the looks and voice were very different, she had been known to be just a vicious in the office as Delores Umbridge was in the Ministry. Both shared very similar positions of power, with one as the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister of Magic, and the other as the personal assistant and right hand of the Overseer. She was the kind of woman that did a wonderful job of getting people to hate her, using the power granted to her by her sponsor to inflict her power on those below her.

Unfortunately, most of the magicals who were about to arrive weren't pleased with their previous government and they weren't about to take the same thing lying down. Or standing up. Or walking. Or at all.

"Thank you, thank you," Sally said a half hour after the vault door closed. Almost all of the children were off playing or exploring their new rooms, but the older teens and adults had almost immediately marched right up to the Overseer's office. "I'm so glad you could come here to live in Vault UK-13. I'm sure you'll really learn to love our facilities and have a wonderful time, don't you know."

She was completely unprepared for the outrage that spewed forth.

"What the hell kind of place is this?" one young wizard demanded. Danish by the accent, his face was rather red in anger. "No doors? Twice as many people to a room than there are beds? Assigned quarters? Toilets and baths open for all to see?"

"Yeah!" a young French woman protested. "What foolishness is this?!"

Andromeda Tonks crossed her arms and glared up at the Overseer's Assistant.

"I think we deserve an explanation, don't you think?" she declared in a loud voice. Her wand was out, held in one hand and she tapped it angrily against her arm. "I'm a married woman and you expect me to share a room with complete strangers, girls my daughter's age, no less, with my husband?"

"Every Vault Dweller was assigned specific quarters to maximize the vault experience," Sally explained in her cutie-baby voice.

"I have no desire to share a room with anyone other than my wife!" Ted growled, an arm across his irate wife's shoulders.

"It is very important that you follow the vault rules," Sally replied. "You will see that-"

"We were told there would be enough rooms for everyone to have their own," Penelope Clearwater stated with a bit of the steel she had used to become Head Girl. "_You_ apparently lied to us. Tell us _why_?"

Many of the other adults were yelling in agreement, shouting phrases in a variety of languages that were rather rude, but fit their moods.

"If you don't settle down, I'll have no choice but to call security," Sally said as if she were speaking to children.

"Go ahead! We're not afraid of you!" one called out. Sally immediately pressed a button and moments later the small mob was flanked by two Protectron robots. One rolled up beside the blonde woman.

"Now all of you go to your assigned quarters," Sally commanded.

"No," challenged Andromeda Tonks, staring down her nose at the little girl with every ounce of her upbringing. Her posture, tone, expression all expressed her displeasure at the woman.

"If you don't return to your quarters I will be forced to use force, don't you know!" she declared.

Andromeda glanced at the Protectron to Sally's left. It had an object in its hand, a weapon, the woman guessed, but did not look like much.

"I don't respond well to threats," a boy said. Harry looked the robot up and down.

"Harry, what are you doing?" Hermione hissed lowly.

"Look, if the rest of these people are right, I'm stuck in a room with four strangers, all girls, who might not even speak the same language as me," Harry said. "I'm not going to let some Malfoy-girl push me around."

"That's it! Protectrons, detain that boy!" she commanded. The robots moved towards him, but Harry pulled out his wand.

"_Expelliarmus_!" he called out, blasting the first machine into a wall.

"Resistance detected!" commented the next as it strode forward, but Harry turned and cast the same spell with the same results.

* * *

In Diagon Alley, Delores Umbridge was ecstatic that she didn't even have to send out dementors to get the boy in trouble. The letter announcing his expulsion and subsequent wand snapping went out and promptly went splat against the vault door as they impacted Bill Weasley's wards.

She was less enthusiastic when she learned the letters never reached their destination.

* * *

Harry turned back to Sally and held out his wand at the suddenly hesitant Protectron.

"Go ahead," he growled. "Call my bluff."

Sally was starting to hyperventilate as she saw the boy use an unknown "technology" to blast her robots. And it was now pointed at her nose. She glanced about and realized the others had also taken out the similar weapons. She'd just thought they were sticks

"Wha-wha-wha" she stammered, holding her hands up in the air. "The O-overseer isn't going to l-let you d-do this!"

Harry leaned slightly so light flashed off his glasses.

"Try me," he half whispered.

"We want an explanation," Andromeda commanded. "_Now_."

"I-don't-know-I-just-did-what-the-executives-told- Maxie-to-do-and-he-told-me-what-to-do," she blurted in a single breath. The tip of Andy's wand was centimeters from her nose and she stared cross-eyed at it in fear.

"Does the Overseer know more?" a man from Norway asked.

"If he does then he didn't tell me," Sally replied in a more normal voice.

"Mr. Potter, if you'd lower your wand, I think she'll be much more willing to discuss these 'rules' she mentioned," Andromeda said. He glanced at her and reluctantly pulled his wand back. Sally sucked in a deep breath and let it out quickly as she took a step back. He glanced at some of the other adults, who were mostly staring at him in shock. "At this point I don't believe the Statute of Secrecy matters all that much." She turned to the crowd.

"Tell me, who here is a witch or a wizard, raise your wand," she asked, holding hers above her head. Her husband, Elijah and Mary were next. Harry and Penelope, along with many of the French and Norwegian vault dwellers also raised their wands. Almost all the adults counted. Andie turned to look at the few who had not raised wands. "I'm guessing you have magical children?"

"Magic? There's no such thing... is there?" one young man said. He held another young woman's hand, both of them only a couple years older than Nymphadora. "Our daughter's two."

"We are," said a French couple. "She etudie ả la Beauxbatons. Merci, '_studies_.' We 'ave two more at zee child school."

"Blood tests," Hermione muttered. Heads turned to her. "It was the blood tests, of course!"

"What? Miss Granger, please explain," Andromeda asked.

"Um, how do you know my name?" the girl asked, suddenly suspicious.

"My daughter is in the same club as a number of your professors, and you're well known due to your association to Harry Potter, here," the woman explained. "Blood?"

"Oh, right," Hermione said. "It must have been a genetic test." Andromeda and Elijah looked quite confused at the term, but Hermione continued on. "I was assigned here, but my parents weren't. Harry's aunt and uncle weren't. But we were. I've spotted Dean Thomas and Anthony Goldstein, muggleborns from Hogwarts."

"My son attends as well," a tall, lithe woman with dark skin attends.

"And our Tracy," Mary Davis said, taking her husband's hand. Tracy was baby sitting while they confronted the Overseer. "Though she is half-blood, not a muggleborn."

"So is it a trap?" a Swedish witch asked. "Some kind of modern witch hunt?"

Heads turned to Sally.

"I don't know anything!" she protested. She was looking around in fear as she realized everyone was armed except for her and the Protectrons were clearly no security.

"You probably have the clues," Harry said, "you were only given half the information."

He turned to glance at the older couples before looking to Hermione and Penelope. "Anyone know spells to make more rooms?"

"We can conjure walls and such, but they won't last," Penelope said. "Not unless we have rune anchors, but then the rooms cannot be changed."

"We need to see if I'm right first," Hermione said. "I know there is a charm to detect a magical person, but it wasn't in the books I've been reading and well, I've got some other things I need to attend to soon."

"It's probably in the library Professor Dumbledore gave us," Penelope suggested.

"He gave you a library?" someone asked in shock.

"Oh, yes, a copy of just about every book he knew of," Harry said. "Don't worry, we're not going to be misers about them."

The adults started thinking things over when another walked in.

"So arrogant, Potter," sneered the newcomer. "Think the Statute of Secrecy doesn't apply to you?"

"_Snape_?" Harry exclaimed in horror as he gaped at the hypocrite, an expression mimicked by most who had the misfortune to have encountered the potions master in the past. "What are _you_ doing here?"

Andromeda looked down her nose at the younger man just as she had done so all those years before. "Severus Snape, still the same. Thank you for ensuring we have an unpleasant stay."

"Well, that is one I did not expect," he said, looking at her. "I never would have expected the sister of Bellatrix LaStrange to be slumming it."

"Oh, cut the social manipulation and dominance plays, Snape!" the woman snapped. "I was a Slytherin, same as you, and unlike you I was a prefect. Anyone who knows me, also knows I'm not my insane sister." She pulled up her sleeves and held her arms up for all to see. "See, nothing there. Care to play show and tell, Snape?"

Harry and Hermione got to see, for once, their least-wanted professor put in his place. The man went white and clutched his forearm under his black suit as if covering a wound.

"Is it wrong that I'm enjoying this?" Harry whispered to Hermione.

"If it is, then I'm in the wrong too," she replied.

Andromeda Tonks turned to the crowd.

"I am not my sister. If I was, I would have never married my husband, Ted," she said nodding to the man who smiled back. "But that's not important. We obviously are part of a bigger plan here. We need to find as much information as possible about the real situation. We'll start with her," she pointed to Sally. "Then we'll talk to 'Maxie' who's hiding in his office."

She turned to Snape. "Then we'll find out what the Death Eater is doing here."

The magicals gasped, especially those old enough to have attended school during the last war. They eyed Snape with suspicion worthy of his mark and gave him a wide berth as they shuffled out of the room. Andromeda stared the man down, glaring down at him with all the presence she could muster. He sneered back, but broke first. Something he'd later regret.

He snorted as if he didn't care about her challenge, spun and stomped off to the living quarters, his jacket flaring behind him like his robes. Harry glared after him, relaxing his stance only after the man was out of sight.

"Of all the vaults in Britain, he had to stalk into this one," Ted Tonks grumbled.

"Watch out Ted," Mary said with a bit of humor to warm up the room. "You sound like Rick in Casablanca."

The man snorted in derision and slipped his arm around Andy's waist. "While we'll always have Paris," Ted commented wryly, "I'm perfectly happy with my wife. And I'm better looking than Bogart chap."

Andy rolled her eyes at his antics.

"What happened in Paris?" someone asked.

"Magical bar fight," Ted replied. "My side won."

"You wish! Believe me, I was there. Definitely a draw," snorted Mary. She chuckled and glanced at the other three graduates of her year. "Damn, it almost feels like we're back in Hogwarts again."

"No," Elijah said. "We're with friends we remember from then, but I, for one, never want to go back to those days."

"No," Ted said, glancing from where Snape left to where Harry was chatting with Hermione. "But it's feeling a bit too similar."

Harry, Hermione and Penelope turned to the older couples.

"Yes, Mr. Potter?" Andy asked.

"I think that Snape might not be the only, um, _marked_ guy in the vault," Harry blurted out nervously. "And... um, the other one's a bit more active."

"What?" Mary Davis gasped. "More Death Eaters in here?" She glanced to where the other adults had gone, but Harry shook his head.

"No, not there," he said, holding up a pouch. "In here."

"A little small isn't it?" asked one of the few non-magical adults left in the room. "And I'm guessing a Death Eater's a bad guy, right?"

"Yes," Ted said, stepping off to the side with the couple. "Let me explain the history behind the display my wife just gave."

He guided them to a sitting room off from the larger waiting area and explained about the magical world, what it involved and the conflicts therein.

"A mokeskin pouch, Harry?" Elijah asked. "How did you get one in there?"

"Crabbe attacked me in the book store so we stuffed him in a bag of holding," Hermione blurted.

"And he just let you?" Mary asked.

"I stunned him," Penelope said, torn between being proud of herself and worried.

"And put him in a full body-bind," Hermione continued. "We weren't really sure what to do, so we stuffed him in a bag. But it's been weeks, so we're..." She blanched in horror. "oh-merlin-did-we-just-make-him-starve-to-death?"

Andromeda blanched as well, but more for the guilt she knew the children must feel. She turned back to Harry. "What was in the bag, Mr. Potter?"

"uh... um..." he prevaricated as he shifted between concern and embarrassment. Andromeda raised an eyebrow and did her best McGonagall impression. Harry stiffened. "All the treacle tarts and filling I could buy. And some drinks."

Hermione pinched the bridge of her nose as she realized her best friend had probably saved the Death Eater's life by the sacrifice of his favorite food.

"Interesting," Mary said. "If he's smarter than I think he is, he'll have kept using spells for water and eating your desserts, though it may have ruined the rest."

"What's it like inside a bag of holding?" Harry asked. "I mean, can he breath?"

"A bubblehead charm will replenish his air," Andromeda said. "He's a Crabbe, so we cannot expect much more than OWL level charms, if that in some areas. Well, and the Unforgivables."

"No house solidarity, Andy?" Mary asked with a smirk.

"I have no wish to consider a Crabbe my peer," Andromeda replied. "They're like charming rocks to walk and talk, but half as personable."

"That does seem to describe his son," Hermione commented. "Though I wonder if he can walk and talk at the same time."

"Well, only one thing to do, open it up," Andromeda replied grinning at the girl's comment. "If you will, Mr. Potter?"

Nervously, Harry reached into his mokeskin pouch as Elijah, Mary and Andromeda kept their wands trained on the spot in front of him. Harry pulled out the bag and dumped the contents on the floor. Cans of treacle tumbled out in a clatter followed by boxes of treacle tarts, cases of butter beer, root beer, ginger beer, pumpkin juice, Nuka-Cola, Sunset Sarsaparilla (which Harry got at an import store simply because he wanted to try it and wouldn't have the opportunity afterward), numerous now-empty boxes, tins and bottles, and a thin black-cloaked Death Eater. It should be noted that Crabbe was _not_ thin when he unwillingly entered his recent home.

Harry stepped back, pulling out his wand, just as the other wizards and witches had done.

"Light?" Crabbe (as the thin wizard was presumed to be) said, pushing himself up from the floor with his hands. He glanced around at the familiar unfriendly faces until he saw Harry Potter glaring down at him. "You!"

"Oh, good, he didn't starve to death," Hermione gasped out before stiffening once more in realization. "Merlin! We let a Death Eater in the vault!"

"Wait until my master hears of this!" Crabbe cackled as he apparated out of the room a split second before the spells flew.

Or at least he intended to apparate out. Crabbe, his family never known for their cerebral talents, _did_ have a license for the magical locomotion, but it never occurred to him that magicals might ward up a muggle place they moved into. Well, Bill Weasley had done just that.

The ward in question was not the standard Anti-Apparation ward.

_No, _not even_ remotely._

Crabbe's magical essence left the center of the room with a "pop" as normal, but reappeared with a "sploosh" as he hit Bill Weasley's special cursed wards. Splinched on the molecular level, his liquified remains sloughed down the side of the nearest wall.

"Okay, apparation bad," Penelope said with wide, horror filled eyes. Mary was very green as they stared at Crabbe's remains.

"I'm suddenly very pleased I neglected to have tea," Elijah admitted. "And I'm equally pleased for the cleaning charms Mum made me learn as a child."

"WHAT WAS THAT?" Sally screamed in horror. They had all pretty much forgotten she existed by that point. Her painful voice unfortunately reminded them.

"That was a very messy solution to what could have been a very messy problem," Andromeda said, thinking back to the lessons taught in the Black family. "I wonder what it would take to get Snape to apparate out..."

Elijah flicked his wand and started to clean and vanish the mess.

"That's not going to happen to everyone we smuggled in, is it?" Harry asked, raising a hand.

"Smuggled? You smuggled people in?" Sally asked, abruptly over her horror at liquid-Crabbe. "I'm telling Maxie!"

She stormed into the Overseer's office where said Overseer was overseeing everything from his hiding place under his desk.

"Are they gone?" he asked Sally.

He didn't react well to angry mobs. And besides, his office was nice and warm and lockable, giving him plenty of time to rethink his situation.

* * *

"How many more are we talking?" Andromeda asked as she escorted the younger three back to the living quarters.

"Um," Hermione said.

"Oh, come on! How many people did you smuggle in?" the older woman demanded in a powerful voice.

"The Greengrasses," Tracey Davis said nervously before she realized the question wasn't directed at her. Mary and Elijah, in the process of re-appropriating their infant, gave her matching raised eyebrows of incredulity. "Oh, um... _oops_?"

"Miss Granger?"

"A few," she admitted.

"Granger? Granger broke the rules?" Tracey asked in shock.

"Davis, you really have no idea," Harry said blandly.

"I'm waiting Miss Granger," Andromeda demanded as they walked to the last room in the corridor. She paused as she saw her daughter fiddling with a cabinet that didn't match the local decor. "Nymphadora?"

"Oh, uh, hi Mum," the auror said in surprise. She opened the cabinet with a nervous flick.

"Thank you!" Susan Bones said with a smile as she stepped into the corridor. "Hi Harry! Hi Hermione." Her eyes flicked to Tracey. "Um... Davis."

"Bones," the Slytherin returned. Tracey's eyes flicked to the door. "Abbot, Longbottom."

Neville walked out behind her, followed by a line of people.

"You too, Nymphadora?" her mother asked. He daughter just gave a weak grin and shrugged.

"Just doing my job, Mum," she said. "And don't call me Nymphadora."

"Job?"

"Auntie wanted to keep us safe, so she had Auror Tonks smuggle us in," Susan explained.

"Hi, Nev," Harry said. Hermione waved to him.

"Hey," the Longbottom boy said. He glanced at the confused adults. "I'm guessing they didn't know about this."

"No," Elijah said with a confused look. "We were quite thoroughly in the dark."

"Who else do we have here?" Mary asked.

"I guess I'll go let out my folks, Mr. Ollivander and the others," Hermione said. She looked up at Andromeda, as she seemed to be the highest authority figure around, official or not. "Where do you think I should set up his shop?"

"You brought _Ollivander_?" Andromeda gasped. The others had similar looks of shock.

Hermione blushed and shrugged. "Our kids are going to need wands, right?"

"Well, that does explain where he vanished to," Elijah admitted.

"How about the wall just inside the big field we saw on the walk in?" Harry suggested. "There's nothing on either side."

"Isn't anyone worried about the magic screwing up the Vault systems?" Tracey asked. "I thought muggle items couldn't work around magic."

"Not actually true," Penelope corrected as a few children walked out of the magical cabinet. "Most muggle items need electricity and there aren't any plugs at Hogwarts. I suppose we could have just brought out own fusion batteries, but well..."

"So all that talk about magic interfering with technology was what?" Hermione asked at realizing a number of sections of Hogwarts, A History had just been proven untrue.

"Pure bollocks, Seamus's mum enlarged their telly at his home so we could watch ManU vs. the Hammers," Dean Thomas said poking his head out of a door in his official vault jumpsuit. "Hey, guys. Why are there so many people in this one hall?"

The collection glanced at each other and decided to move to a larger space.

"I'll stay here and help the others in there get settled in," Nymphadora said, pointing a thumb at the cabinet that opened to the magical flat.

* * *

The field room was huge, quite possibly the largest interior space any of them had seen, save for the Chamber of Secrets, but that was more a matter of height rather than width and depth.

"Wow, an indoor greenhouse," Neville exclaimed as he watched the ceiling sprinklers dribble water on the short grass.

"I think it's supposed to be football pitches and maybe field hockey and Cricket," Hermione said, "But sure, we could plant some here and there."

"I always wanted one for the winter, but Uncle Algie could never find the right kind of light," Neville said.

"Big field later, Ollivander's now," Andromeda said, turning Hermione to face the wall.

"Oh, right," the girl said with a blush. She opened the pouch and pulled out a small box. Setting it at about eye height on the metal wall, she tapped it once with the tip of the wall and stepped away. For a moment it did nothing, just stayed stuck on the wall. Then it folded out to double its size. A moment later it folded outward again, doubling its size. For the next little bit it would pause, unfold, pause and unfold, until it was the familiar wood and stone storefront so many of them recognized from Diagon Alley. One full size, it shivered a bit and blended perfectly with the metal wall behind it until it was impossible to tell it had ever been separated.

The structure glowed once, brightly, then became a perfectly normal wand shop... well, as normal as any wand shop could be. Hermione opened the door and stepped inside.

"Mum! Dad! It worked!" the brilliant girl said, running inside to give her parents hugs. She quickly released them to hug first her maternal grandparents then her paternal grandparents.

"Well, done, Miss Granger," Ollivander said, standing up. He walked to the window and flipped the sign from "closed" to "open." He grinned at the confused looks from both within and without the shop. "One cannot do business if one is not open for it."

"We can go out now? It's safe?" an older woman asked nervously.

"Nanna, it's fine," Hermione assured her. "Come on, come on!"

"So, Hermione the witch, eh?" Menelaus's step-father asked. The girl blushed, eliciting a chuckle from those inside. "Let's go see this vault."

* * *

"It's so bad, Maxie," Sally said, pacing back and forth in front of the Overseer's desk. "They're breaking the rules! And they've got these weird techy weapons and they call themselves wizards and witches and they said they smuggled people in. The Rules! They broke the Rules, Maxie!"

"Sally, I'm not sure what you want me to do about it," the man said.

"They need to be punished!" she declared.

"Didn't you said one boy managed to take out two Protectrons with a stick?" Overseer Maximilian Barker asked nervously. He glanced at the terminal briefly, considering if he should try to contact Vault-Tech.

"ooo! It just makes me soooooooo mad, don't you know?" Sally protested in her cutie-baby voice, making her sound like badly voice acted child's cartoon. She resumed her pacing as the Overseer continued to stare at the computer terminal in front of him.

He would have to rework Vault-Tech's plan to suit the new situation. He would have to adapt.


	10. Chapter 10

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

**Chapter Ten**

* * *

"Not just no," Nymphadora Tonks said. "_Hell_ no."

The point of contention was the issue of sleeping arrangements.

Andromeda sighed at her daughter's reluctance. "I know it is strange, but we simply don't have enough secure rooms to go around," the woman explained. "We're not in complete control, but we still have to sleep and keep an eye out. And with the added people, we're dealing with more chaos than expected."

"So we're going along with the stupid assigned bed system because we wanted to save a few lives?" her daughter asked. Truth be told, Tonks and Hermione were not the only smugglers of people. There were, in fact a lot more involved in hauling people in. Most of them were poorer purebloods who weren't sure what to believe, but knew of safety with friends, or families of ministry officials, as well as a few overseas people. The core of the vault dwellers were still those with ties to the muggle world who received vault tickets. "You do realize what I'm upset about, right?"

"Yes, the four adult women to every adult male," Andromeda said. "It's a crappy ratio. But we're rearranging it a bit to make things work. Most rooms will be single sex for the meantime until we can get something worked out. You just got assigned a mixed sex room, not that this is a punishment for what you did."

"The '_male_' you assigned to my room is Professor Snape!" Tonks exclaimed, her hair turning red with anger. "How is that _not_ a punishment?"

"I'd say it was," Dean Thomas argued, sticking his head in the room.

"Hush you," Andromeda said, shooing him from the room.

"Yes, Ma'am," he said as he left. Andromeda turned back to her daughter.

"What else do you suggest for him? He has to sleep somewhere tonight," Andromeda said. "I'm not telling you to undress in front of him, or heaven's forbid, have sex with him," both had a shudder at the very thought, "I'm just saying that as the only actually trained Auror, even if you are young, you should be the one to keep an eye on the Death Eater."

"Why can't we just turn his greasy hair into a portkey and send him out of here?" Nymphadora demanded.

"Because if the wards react to the portkey like they do apparation, he might just end up splashed against the walls in liquid form, as satisfying as that might be," Andromeda explained, getting a confused look from her daughter. She sighed as she realized Nymphadora hadn't been part of the mob. "Crabbe was here earlier and got to be the test subject. He's shuffled off the mortal coil on his own recognizance."

"He's dead?"

"Liquified."

Nymphadora whistled. "Wow, Charlie's brother does good work." She shook her head. "But still not seeing the bad side of that."

"It's not like you're going to be stuck with him forever," Andromeda argued. "Just until we can set up some dark corner for him to lurk where we can place plenty of warning signs to keep people away."

"You really don't like him, do you?"

Andromeda snorted. "Darling daughter, what gave you that idea?"

"It's just I rarely see that kind of reaction from people who weren't his students," Nymphadora explained. "Marauders excluded, of course."

"I was a prefect for Slytherin when he was a first year and second year," Andromeda explained. "He was a toerag then, he's a toerag now."

"Dumbledore trusts him," Nymphadora said, even as she couldn't believe she had been manipulated into defending the potions master.

"Then Dumbledore's a fool," her mother argued, re-crossing her arms and giving her daughter a kind look. "I trust _you_ to keep the rest of us safe. That's why I'm asking you to do this, not anyone else."

"I'd feel safer with a team behind me," she argued. "Watching a dark wizard alone is pretty much suicide."

"I seriously doubt he'd kill you," Andromeda said. "Not when he's trapped in here with the rest of us. He might be a Death Eater, but he's not one of the faceless minions. He wants to live."

"Okay, I'll do it, but I'll do it my way," she said.

"Fine, just make sure we've got eyes on him at all times," Andromeda told her daughter.

"So, sleeping arrangements," Hermione said, looking at the large room. The room had three beds, each big enough for three people. Shelves along the walls and a window of some tropical beach on one wall. There was no door, no cabinets or lockers and only one bureau per bed.

"It shouldn't be that difficult to decide," Susan Bones argued. "Five to a room. You, me, Davis and the Greengrass girls. Hanna is staying with a few of the younger girls who are getting homesick."

"Are you sure?" Hermione asked, glancing at Tracey Davis, who rolled her eyes as she combed out Astoria Greengrass's long hair. "I mean, sharing beds?"

"What? Do you think I'm going to sleep with a boy in the room?" Susan asked.

"I'd sleep with you, Susan," Dean Thomas said, sticking his head in.

"What was that? You want me to hit you with my best hex?" Susan asked the Gryffindor boy, cupping her hand to her ear.

"Wow, look at the time," Dean commented, glancing at his watchless wrist, and slipping down the hall. Hermione sighed and rolled her eyes.

"I'm really starting to hate the no-doors situation," Hermione argued.

"You know, we could just sleep in the rooms tonight, but then use the beds from the magical tents you smuggled in," Trace suggested from the other side of the room. "It's not like we're going to hex you during the night."

"I certainly hope not," Harry said from the doorway. "Hermione, your parents wanted to see you. They're in the caff."

"Thanks, Harry," Hermione said as she got up to leave. Harry flashed her a smile as she ran down the hall.

"So, Harry Potter comes down to speak us mere mortals," Tracey snarked.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, thoroughly confused by the statement. "And here I was hoping I'd left Malfoy behind."

Tracey's face flashed red. Susan's eyes flicked between Harry and Tracey before stepping backwards to a bed. No one said anything for a moment.

"She's talking about your reputation," Daphne Greengrass explained finally.

"What reputation?"

Tracey rolled her eyes and Astoria snorted lightly, sounding like a young Andromeda Tonks. Daphne took a deep breath and tossed the book to the side.

"You don't talk with anyone but Weasley and Granger," Daphne told him.

"That's not true," Harry protested. "I talk with lots of people."

"Bullshite," Tracey muttered, eliciting a giggle from Astoria.

"Potter, everyone sees you with the two of them like a prince and his favorite retainers, prancing about the school," Daphne continued, shooting a glare at her housemate even as she straightened her glasses. The tall blonde Tracey just rolled her eyes.

"They're my best friends, why shouldn't I spend time with them? I talk with Dean and Neville about stuff," Harry protested.

"Well, no one outside Gryffindor sees that," the eldest Greengrass girl explained. "When someone does try to talk you get confrontational and angry."

"That's not really true, Daphne," Susan said. "He only does that when it's Malfoy and his goon squad."

"There's not really any reason for me to be nice to someone who'd be quite willing to hex me the moment my back was turned," Harry argued. "And I'm not a prince, and they're not retainers. They're my friends."

"Then why as soon as Weasley's out of the picture do you find a replacement?" Daphne asked with just a touch of a sneer.

"What are you talking about?" Harry asked, clearly confused.

"Clearwater," Tracey said.

"She's just a friend," Harry said. "We just got to know each other this summer."

Tracey snorted.

"It's no secret you're the Headmaster's favorite," Astoria said, speaking for the first time since he entered the room. "You get more points for doing the same things that other people do."

"And Snape takes away points for 'breathing too loud' or 'being a know-it-all' so don't say it's a points thing, because that's all screwed up," Harry countered. "And he doesn't take points or give detentions when one of his favorites gets in trouble."

"He does, he dresses them down in the common room in front of the whole house," Astoria replied in a contrite tone.

"Which no one outside of Slytherin ever got to see or even know about," Harry pointed out, using their same argument. "And I note these don't seem to impact house points."

"I'm with Harry on this one," Susan said. "It's not really a punishment if it's not clear across the board. That lets your house have an unfair advantage to the House Cup."

"And tell me, did Draco Malfoy ever get a dressing down for calling Hermione a mudblood? Did he ever get punished in second year for telling people that they were going to get murdered by Slytherin's Heir?" Harry asked pointedly. "You talk about my reputation, but Malfoy's actions basically say that Snape will let him get away with anything. Well, I for one am glad he isn't here right now."

"Why? So you can-"

"Davis, I don't really care what you think I want to do," Harry said, cutting her off. "I _really_ don't. But it's clear that you have almost no idea who I am outside of my name and some made up reputation. And besides, if past history is any example, everyone's opinions will change one way or another."

"What does that mean?"

"Remember when everyone decided I was the heir of Slytherin? Or when they thought I put my name in the Goblet of Fire?" Harry demanded. "Or how about when I told everyone that Voldemort had returned?" He pointedly ignored the four yelps at the name. "Or how about when I was the Boy-Who-Lived or any of the other times people seemed to hang on my every word or giggle if my shadow hit them when I was walking down the hall? My reputation seems to change with the wind, so why should I care what you think right now? It'll be different tomorrow."

He set his jaw, spun on his heels and stalked out the door with an even stride. The four girls gaped in surprise for a moment. After a bit of nervous silence, Astoria raised her hand.

"I never thought he was the Heir of Slytherin," she admitted. "But Tracey, did you really have to snap at him like that?"

"What?" the older girl protested. "All I did was call it like I saw it."

"Davis, if that's how you saw it, you need glasses," Susan commented. "Harry's not like that. Sure, I kind of jumped on the anti-Harry bandwagon last year, but after a while I knew it was a mistake. Cedric really took us to task for it and we realized it wasn't his fault." She paused, cracking her neck and rolling her shoulders. "And besides, he went out of his way to tell people they were in danger."

"We didn't get a letter from him," Astoria said haughtily.

"And I heard from Hermione that he didn't send any to people he knew had Death Eater ties," Susan argued. "Your family might not, but you can't deny that your family has a pretty dark reputation."

Both Greengrass girls had sour looks at that.

"I got one," Tracey admitted, suddenly feeling a tiny bit of shame. "Or rather, my brother did. Roger, in Ravenclaw three years ahead of us."

"Fleur's date?" Susan asked. "I thought he was Davies."

"Idiot healer wrote his name down wrong on the birth certificate," Tracey explained. "It would cost a fortune and a half to get the Ministry to fix it, so he was stuck."

"Why isn't he here, too?" Daphne asked.

"When Mum was told she needed to register us, Roger said he didn't want any part of the muggle world," Tracey explained. She sighed, pausing the comb mid-stroke. "Being Fleur's date humiliated him since he couldn't even resist her allure even when suppressed. He's been angry for a while now, since people kept ribbing him about it. He's determined to be the next Percy Weasley, since he managed to fly so high so quickly. 'Can't do that in a hole in the ground,' he said."

"And your folks let him get away with that?" Susan asked in confusion.

"Mum and Dad were not happy with his decision, but he's an adult," said Tracey with a shrug. "It was his decision."

"Sad," Susan said. "My aunt stayed behind too. Most of the others Auror Tonks smuggled in were in similar situations. Families stayed home, but sent us here to be safe."

"I'm just glad we're here and not going to Hogwarts," Daphne said. She smiled at Tracey. "I'm ever so grateful you smuggled us in."

"Oh, I'm even more grateful than her, Tracey," Astoria said with a bit of a smirk. Tracey matched her smirk and raised her a little tickle. Daphne rolled her eyes.

"What's mum doing?" Daphne asked.

"I think she was meeting with Mrs. Tonks, Mum, Dad and some of the other adults," Tracey said as she resumed combing Astoria's hair.

"What do you think is going to happen?" Susan asked. "I know a few other people here, but most seem to be strangers. I think I spotted two I recognize from Beauxbatons last year."

"We'll see," Daphne said. "We've only been here for a few hours, after all."

"Knock, knock!"

They looked up to see a familiar face leaning on the door frame.

"Zabini? What are you doing here?" Daphne asked in shock. He smirked and glanced about.

"Huh, badger in the snake pit," he said as his eyes landed on Susan.

"What of it?" Susan demanded, her hand slipping to her wand.

"Whoa, easy there," he said, holding up his empty hands. "See, no wand. I come in peace."

"I've got to admit, I'm surprised to see you," Tracey said. "Your mother mess up after your last step-father?"

"Ha. And Ha again. You should go into comedy, you've got a talent there," the dark skinned boy replied dryly.

"No, Mum keeps a close eye on both sides of the street. Her second husband was a muggleborn, so we were registered with the government, got the tickets and here we are," He said, motioning to the vault around them. "No trickery or anything. I'm staying next door with Longbottom, some Norwegian named Bear Valley, or something, Dean Thomas, and some blond French kid about nine years old who doesn't speak a lick of English or Italian."

"Ah, so you get to inflict your presence on us on a daily basis, I take it?" Daphne inquired.

"Awe, don't say it like that," he pleaded. "But yeah, looks like we're neighbors again. I'm actually surprised Potter isn't staying with us since he knows Longbottom and Thomas."

"Tracey here probably chased him off before he could find a bed," Daphne noted with a nod to her outraged friend. "She decided she needed to tell him how much she disliked him."

"I did not!"

"What else did you think that conversation would convey?" Susan asked.

"Oh," Blaise said with a dark chuckle. "You asked him about his 'reputation' I take it?"

"Yeah, why?" Tracey asked.

"Because it's a load of bull," Zabini explained. "You both forgot Snape's a Slytherin too. He's been at this game of cunning and manipulation longer than us. He kept telling us Potter was a spoiled little prince and most of Slytherin started to see him in that light. The facts on one side make Potter look like he thinks he's above everyone else, but then think about how everyone treated him? Of course he's not going to make friends with people who treat him like shite. With how Malfoy treats him, I'm surprised he was even civil enough to give us the time of day."

"How'd you see all this?" Astoria challenged.

"Please," Zabini said with a roll of his eyes. "With _my_ mother? And much more importantly, my ambitious little sister? I'm the eldest, so I really needed to pay attention or else I'd be the _former_ eldest, considering how much my sister takes after my mother. I keep my eyes open. Potter lives with muggles. Haven't you ever seen him when he gets on or off the train? Those clothes he wears? I seriously doubt those are his choice."

"Aren't baggy clothes in fashion?" Susan asked. "In the muggle world, I mean."

"Not that I know of," he said. He looked at Tracey and shook his head. "Merlin, Davis. You might have really screwed the pooch on this one. That's worse than the time you-"

"Thank you for your opinion, Zabini," Tracey snapped, cutting him off.

"I suppose your troubles in Slytherin were because of ancestry," Zabini mused. "Not that I follow Malfoy's way of thinking, but enough in our house do, so it tainted your reputation."

"Oh, bugger off," Tracey growled with a flat look. "Why didn't you treat Potter differently?"

"And stand out as a blood traitor? In Slytherin?" Zabini asked holding his hand to his chest as he gasped in faux shock. "Hell no. I'm a Zabini, we're born and bred as hypocrites of the highest class. I've got to do my part to live up to expectations."

"Of course, none of these school divisions matter anymore," Susan put in as she pulled out a ball of yarn and some knitting needles. "We don't have houses, and I don't think we should. If anything this conversation and the one we had with Harry should tell us that."

"You might be onto something there, Bones," he agreed. "So who's your fifth?"

"Granger," Daphne replied. "She's a little scared of the big bad snakes."

"No, she isn't," Hermione said from behind Blaise. "She is, however, incredibly annoyed with the three who live in this room. And, quite frankly, you can't blame me, miss I-will-follow-Parkinson's-lead." She pushed her hair over one shoulder. "Forgive this mudblood for not wanting to spend time with people who expressed interest in my death."

"I never said that!" Daphne protested in shock.

"Actions speak louder than words, Greengrass," Hermione growled. "Every time you stood behind Pansy Parkinson, you were telling everyone you agreed with what she was saying. Merlin, if that's the way you Slytherins act, it's no wonder the whole wizarding world thinks you're all a bunch of dark wizards and witches just waiting to kiss Voldemort's robes."

Zabini smirked. "Lady's got a point."

"Did I really do that?" Daphne asked, looking to her sister and Tracey for confirmation.

"Yes, you did," Zabini said.

"I didn't ask _you_," Daphne hissed as she squinted at him with displeasure. She straightened her glasses and rolled her shoulders back.

"I don't know, I wasn't really part of it," Astoria admitted. Tracey shrugged. "Susan?"

"You did come off as a bit of a Parkinson groupie," Susan admitted as she knitted. "When your leader calls someone a mudblood, and you don't argue, it's like you're saying it too."

"You don't know what it's like in there!" Daphne protested, thinking back to all the times she had disagreed with something Parkinson or Malfoy had said, but never spoke up.

"And yet another reason why the house system was a bad idea," Zabini commented. "Splitting people up by personality types at eleven is as stupid as any other kind of group segregation. No other magical country does it. It's a wonder Britain has stood as long as it has."

"As much as a political discussion might be interesting, I'm a bit knackered," Hermione said. "So go fly back to your own little perch."

"It _is_ a bit late, isn't it?" Zabini commented. "Night, ladies."

The moment he left, Hermione put up a privacy spell that filtered sound and turned the doorway opaque. She spun around and glare at Tracey.

"Let me make one thing clear," Hermione growled like a displeased lioness. Her hair seemed to almost frizzle about her in anger. "You talk like that to Harry again and I'll make you wish you were dancing in the radioactive rain."

"What?" Tracey asked, shocked by the sudden change in personality. "Granger!"

"Do you have any idea what it's like to be Harry Potter? Any damn clue?" she demanded. "No, you don't. So don't go spouting off about something you know nothing about. Harry kept me and Ron close because we were the only damn people to befriend him! Even Ron was a prat half the time! So if you think you're going to treat my friend like a sack of shite, you can go to hell."

She spun to the only non-Slytherin present aside from herself.

"Sorry, Susan, but I'm going to sleep in one of the magical tents I brought," Hermione said before marching out of the room, leaving the three Slytherins gaping after her.

"Ah, so Potter-"

"Davis, don't dig your hole any deeper," Susan chided. "Of course he told Hermione. She's his best friend. And you did treat him like shite. We're not at Hogwarts anymore. The old rules don't apply."

"I'm starting to think you're right," Astoria agreed.


	11. Chapter 11

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

By DireSquirrel

Chapter 11

.

* * *

"Ah, Longbottom," Zabini said as he sauntered back into his room. "Looks like we're bedmates."

Neville did his best Hedwig impression as his eyes went wide and blinked at the boy in disbelief.

"Three beds, five blokes," Zabini commented, pointing to each boy in turn and then at himself. "The bed's huge, we'll just transfigure something into a screen to put between us."

"So who gets the single?" Bjorn Dalen asked.

"I figure the kid should get it," Dean said. "I mean, he doesn't speak English, so it might seem a bit strange when one of us blokes climbs into bed with him."

"Not asking for it yourself?" Zabini inquired.

"A bed screen's fine for me. I just want to sleep," Dean said. "If it's a problem I can share with Neville."

"We're not going to have any trouble from you, are we?" Neville asked, staring intently at Zabini.

"Relax, Longbottom. It's not like I'm Malfoy," Zabini defended. "Hell, if he were in here right now, I'd hex him, stuff him in one of those sports lockers by the pitch and give us an extra bed. No daddy to save him here."

"Not a fan?" Bjorn asked. All three Hogwarts boys shook their heads negative. "I for one hope this gets sorted out soon."

"Me too," Neville said. "I don't think Tonks, Harry or Hermione knew it was going to be like this. The pamphlet Harry sent me didn't describe it like this at all."

"I think they were lied to. We were certainly lied to," Bjorn said motioning to himself and the French boy. "I'm not even supposed to be here. I'm still supposed to be at Trondheim for University."

"University? You're not a wizard?" Neville asked.

"No, decided to focus on my education instead," the blond man said, leaning back on one of the beds. The other three gaped at him. "What? I was given a choice between flicking a wand and unveiling the secrets of the universe. I chose the secrets of the universe."

"You chose _not_ to learn magic?" Zabini asked in absolute horror with Neville similarly confused by the choice. The tall black teen shook his head. "Merlin, I need a bloody smoke."

* * *

"Hey," Harry said, sitting down to Hermione.

"Hey," she said in return.

They were on a bench outside Ollivander's along the walking path that divided the playing fields.

"I've been exploring, since I was too angry to sleep," Harry admitted. "A pool, a few meters deep is over there towards the west. A running track, too."

"I thought this would be different," Hermione said.

"I'd say it is, we don't have these kind of options at Hogwarts," Harry argued.

"I wasn't talking about that," Hermione clarified. She sighed and ran her hands through her hair, pushing her mane back over her shoulders. She leaned back and looked up at the metal ceiling behind the bright grow-lights. "I went back to the room after you told me what they said."

"Oh?" Harry asked.

"It wasn't any different than at Hogwarts. They kept spouting the same vitriol they did at school," Hermione reported. "Jumping to conclusions before getting any evidence about who you are. They didn't even realize what they looked like to everyone else. I mean, if you don't speak up against something you don't believe in, why are the rest of us supposed to believe you don't agree?"

"Who was that?"

"Daphne Greengrass," Hermione said with a half-growl. "She was always there, part of Pansy Parkinson's Pretty Preppy Posse, standing at her shoulder. She was surprised when I called her out on it. Then she said 'you don't know what it was like in there!' Screamed it at me, actually. I told her that actions speak louder than words."

She leaned forward and screamed wordless aggravation into her hands.

"I thought the vault would be a new start," Hermione said. "I thought I would be able to leave the preconceptions behind and start over again."

"I'm here for you, your parents and grand-parents are here for you, Penelope's like a big sister," Harry said.

"I know," Hermione agreed, "But you've always been there for me since the Troll. My parents have always been there for me. Penelope hasn't always, but she was a prefect first, so-"

"Hermione, you invited her into your house. You went out of your way to be more than just a student and prefect or student to Headgirl," Harry reminded her. "She did too. She didn't have to do all that charmwork for us. She could have charged us for her time, but she didn't. The three of us watched movies together, followed shows on the telly. We're friends, you, me, Penelope."

"I know, but... It's just like when I went to Hogwarts all over again," Hermione explained. "I've always been different. Smarter, driven. I've needed to prove myself, to be the best. I wasn't ever good at sports, not really. I wasn't the funny kid, or the budding artist, or the singer. All I had was my brain, my mind. It kept me apart from people my own age. When I got my Hogwarts letter and the visit from Professor McGonagall, I kept thinking that I was finally going to be with people like me, that I was special and I could be with people who shared my interests."

She sighed and leaned back again. Harry put an arm over her shoulder and gave her a half hug.

"Hogwarts had magic, but it was the same thing with different labels," Hermione explained. "That Halloween... I just can't say how much Ron's words hurt. I was trying to help. I know I have a forceful personality, but I just wanted to help." She paused and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. "When he said those things, it was like my expectations had betrayed me. All my hopes and dreams were flushed away."

"Things got better, didn't they?" Harry asked.

"Some, having you and Ron come around helped, but there was always something that kept up divisions," Hermione replied. "Having friends for the first time was great, even if you two weren't as driven as me. But the houses, the rules. It was like everything was designed to split us up, not bring us together. I hated it, still hate it. Aside from you and Ron, well, Ron most of the time, but not all of it, my intelligence, status as your friend and status as a muggleborn kept up the friction. There was no one in my dorm who shared my interests. I kept wanting to ask 'why' things worked the way they did. The few times I did ask, I was laughed at. Lavender, Parvati. Even a few of the Ravenclaws in our year. It made me feel stupid."

"You're not stupid," Harry said. "Of any possible insult, that's the most untrue thing anyone could call you."

"That's why it hurt so much," Hermione admitted. "I'd do something my way and when it wasn't how it was 'just done' they'd ridicule me. Rarely to my face, but it's happened enough so I know the signs. It was worse when I refused to ditch you when the rest of the student body was having another one of their 'let's blame Harry' events."

"Ah, yes, the newest Hogwarts tradition," Harry said. "I'm sorry your association with me caused you trouble."

"It's not your fault, Harry," Hermione said. "I wouldn't abandon you. I'm no fair-weather friend, no matter what some people said. Talking to snakes or not."

"Thank you," Harry said, giving her shoulders a friendly squeeze.

"I don't think I can go back there," Hermione admitted.

"Well, I happen to know somebody had a few extra magical tents brought in and there just happens to be a field right in front of us," Harry suggested. Hermione grinned and elbowed him playfully in the ribs.

"Don't be such a prat," she said with a grin.

"Come on, let's pull out the first tent," Harry said. "I think we've got one that isn't completely filled with books. I swear you must have bought out fifteen stores."

"What did I just say about being a prat?"

* * *

"Okay, Snape, this is how it's going to work," Nymphadora Tonks informed the greasy potions master.

"Do you really think you can command me, little witch? I know you inside and out, or did you forget those seven years I taught you?" Snape replied with a sneer. Tonks cocked her head, gave him a once over and clearly found him lacking.

"Look, Professor Dumbledore might have trusted you as a spy," she said. "Hell, that's probably what you're doing right now, spying for both your masters on Harry," she paused briefly as the greasy man gave a derisive snort that she took as confirmation, "But in here? All that matters is the mark on your arm and the fact that pretty much every Hogwarts student and graduate here hates your guts and doesn't trust you as far as Sally could throw you. As far as you're concerned, I'm the boss."

"What?" he demanded.

"Which is why you are going to march right into that cabinet flat," Tonks said, her wand out, pointing to the cabinet she'd used to smuggle people in. "Now."

"Fine! But we will discuss this with the Headmaster in the morning," Snape snapped. "Or did you feel you were not required to bring your mirror."

"Inside grease-ball," she growled, prodding him with the tip of her wand, using a bit of sleight of hand to pocket the man's. He sneered once more and took a step inside, fully expecting her to follow. His cunning seemed to temporarily abandon him as the doors shut tight behind him and refused to open. He reached for his familiar magical tool, only to find the wand missing.

Very pleased with herself, Tonks tucked the shrunken cabinet flat back into her locket and walked off to find a warm bed.

"You'll pay for this, Tonks!" Snape growled lowly. He looked around the flat and realized it seemed cleared of all personal items from the people staying in it. Otherwise, it was well planed out with a full kitchen, bed and bath. There was a living room and a large second bedroom with a walk-in closet almost as large. Snorting, he removed his jacket and began unloading his own smuggled items, revealing an entire potions laboratory with two cauldrons of each type and all the ingredients he, Dumbledore and the Dark Lord could get their hands on.

Once it was set up, he decided it wasn't the right feel. Some people used a teddy bear to sleep well, others used a partner. Snape slept best surrounded by retro-dungeon chic. Considering it seemed like he'd be spending much of his time in there, he decided to charm the walls, ceiling and floor to look like stone as soon as he got his wand back.

He moved his hand to his wand when he noticed movement in the closet. Throwing open the door, he froze as he came face to face with Neville Longbottom who had a bundle of plants in his arms.

"What are you doing here?" they both demanded in unison. Snape in anger, Neville in fear. It was then that Snape realize he had a pencil in his pocket, and not his wand.

"Ridikulus!" Neville said, flicking his wand, turning Snape's robes into a fluffy pink tutu complete with a tiara and ballet shoes. He started chuckling, but it trailed off when the very perturbed Severus Snape proved not to be a boggart. The amusement vanished along with the color in his face as Neville gripped his wand with both hands.

"Oh, Merlin."

Still dressed in the pink tutu, Snape sneered in impotent fury.

"Indeed."

* * *

45 minutes later in the living quarters.

Blaise Zabini looked at the empty bed-half, then glanced around as he realized they were missing a roommate.

"I didn't scare Longbottom _that_ much did I?"

Dean just shrugged.

"Dibs on the whole bed."

* * *

The sun rose, but the only sign from within the Vault that morning came was an alarm that had all vault dwellers up almost instantly.

"Hi there vault dwellers it's time for our mandatory physical education hour, don't you know," Sally said through the intercom. "How 'bouts everyone meets me and our wonderful Overseer at the athletic fields. Anyone who tries to stay and can listen to my cute little Klaxon instead."

"I do believe that's a woman who deserves every curse we can throw at her and not kill her," Ted grumbled as he and Andromeda sat up in bed. They had chosen to room for the night with the Davis couple with a single muggleborn mother-to-be from Beauxbatons taking the free bed. They had conjured privacy screens between the beds but which had vanished by morning.

"If it's not her voice, it's her attitude," Elijah grumbled, flicking his wand over his body to make himself somewhat presentable. "Does she really think this is going to work?"

"It seems she has gotten over her little break with reality last night," his wife grumbled. "I don't like the idea of cursing her, not really, but these little power plays are going to get old quickly."

"I do not believe she knows who she is dealing with," the young French mother-to-be said with just the slightest accent. "The reputation of Harry Potter is not the same in France as it is in the UK."

"I wasn't aware he was known out of Britain," Ted commented.

"Oh yes, but until the Tri-Wizard, most of us thought his reputation exaggerated to make your nation look good," she replied. "Unlike your British press, his conscription into the competition was well documented in the international papers and on the wireless. His self sacrifice to save the Delacour girl made him something of a hero in France."

"Why?"

"He gave up his own chances of winning to save another, a pretty child no less," she explained. "Some thought at first it was done to curry favor with the Delacours' father, but it was quickly decided that no British wizard could actually have the knowledge of international politics for such a goal. At least not at that age, and especially one so notorious for avoiding the public as Harry Potter."

"Notorious?" Elijah asked, wincing as Sally turned the klaxons on for another thirty second burst of sonic torture. Mary hit it with a silencing charm, but it did little since every hallway and room had it's own speaker. "Notorious?"

"Oh, yes, for someone you Brits held in such high esteem, he was never paraded around, never gave speeches, there were no statues of him built," the woman said as she struggled to get the jumpsuit zip up over her growing belly. "Rarely was he seen in public. The international press considered him quite the recluse, something of a modern day Howard Hughes."

She grimaced and tapped the blue cloth with her wand, letting the fabric slack a bit. With a satisfied smile, she zipped the jumpsuit closed.

"I _do_ regret not smuggling, as others here did," the woman said. "I so wanted more than just my holotapes of my family."

"Where is the father?" Mary asked. The woman just rolled her eyes and gave a dismissive wave.

"Somewhere. Does not matter. He did what I wanted and is now out of my hair," she said.

"Wait, you _want_ to be a single mother?" Andromeda asked, scandalized. Ted grinned; it wasn't often that his Andy was shocked, but it was always entertaining.

"Oh, yes. I have no need of a man to hold my hand," she said. "Let's go see this physical education."

"No father?" Andromeda whispered in confusion. Ted patted her on the back.

"Andy, my sweet Andy," Ted informed her. "There are more things on Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

* * *

Most of the Vault Dwellers were there before Sally showed up. They were just clumped into groups chattering amongst themselves, not in nice firm lines by alphabetical order. And there was a tent.

A tent.

On her field.

How did they have a tent?

She stomped right up to the tent and threw the flap back, only to see a much larger space inside with what looked like a complete kitchen. Standing in a tight undershirt and shorts was the man who had pointed the stick at her the previous night. He stared at her in confusion as he was in the process of cracking an egg with his other hand.

"Can I help you?" Harry asked in a tone that really said "get the fuck out" to anyone paying attention.

"Look! It's a Tardis-Tent!" one child said excitedly.

"Wha-what the hell are you?" Sally demanded. He looked at her like she was crazy.

"A person... why?"

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"Cooking breakfast," he replied. "Which I'd like to get back to, the skillet is hot already and I don't want the eggs to burn." She instead chose to open and close her mouth like a fish. "I don't really appreciate you letting everyone see me standing in my skivies, either, so please leave."

She stiffened at the clear dismissal and shivered as she tried to find the words.

Someone let out a wolf whistle.

"Looking good Harry!" a familiar voice called out.

"Katie? Huh, another good surprise," he said. He then turned and sent a flat look to a red head giving him elevator eyes. "And Susan? Susan! _Susan_!"

"Yum," she said before blinking and looking at his face. "I mean: _what_?"

"Show's over."

He lifted his wand once more and flicked the flap shut.

Furious at being dismissed, Sally tried to rip the flap open again, but it wouldn't budge.

"Wow," Susan said after a moment. "I didn't know he was hiding all that under the robes and baggy clothes."

"Oh, yes, I saw," Katie said with a bit of a purr.

A number of other young women were nodding appreciatively.

"Can I play in the Tardis-tent?" one child asked.

"When are Mummy and Daddy going to pick me up?" asked another child. "I wanna go home."

That seemed to open the floodgates and a deluge of requests to be reconnected with their families came from the assorted children.

Andromeda looked like she was going to explode. Say what you will about the Blacks: dark, evil, insane, but one thing always remained a constant: Family was Family. For her, the idea that these children had been separated from their families was absolutely horrific. She stalked up to Sally, snatched her by the ear and hauled her to her feet.

"Owie!" Sally exclaimed, struggling to get away. Andromeda pulled the woman's ear right to her lips, slapping away the blonde's hands.

"You are going to explain things, you are doing to do it fully, and you are going to do it now," the former Slytherin Prefect hissed. "These power plays cease immediately. You are no longer in control. If you don't comply then I will be forced to explain in detail why my family has been feared for centuries. It might take hours, and actions speak louder than words and I'm feeling very active right now."

"I don't know anything. I just followed what I was supposed to do! Nobody's doing what Maxie was told they would do!"

"What was he told? You gave us some excuse last night, but the truth this time, in front of everybody," Ted commanded. "It's in your best interest. I don't know how much longer my wife can restrain herself."

"Everyone was supposed to stay in their assigned rooms, get up at the right time and go to work at the right time," she explained.

"And why, exactly, did you not explain any of these things yesterday?" Andromeda interrogated.

"It was just supposed to happen!" Sally said.

"Why were the room assignments 5 women and one man to a room?" Elijah asked. "I'm really curious because it looks like you were promoting polygamy. I'm a happily married man. I have no interest in other women, much less some so much younger than me. One went to school with my daughter for Merlin's sake! That's just not right!"

"It was all assigned by Vault-Tech," Sally replied. "Please let me go! It hurts!"

"Good, because pain was precisely my goal," Andromeda stated flatly. "So, your excuse is that you were only following orders? You were just going with the crowd? How incredibly stupid."

A number of people were nodding in agreement.

"But everything got messed up! That girl with the hair and pulling that man out of the pouch and the tent and that shop," Sally said, pointing to where Ollivander's was open for business, looking very out of place when compared to the gunmetal gray of the other vault walls. "Nothing's the way it's supposed to be!"

"Where's this Overseer we're supposed to have?" one young man asked. "We saw him, what, once? Isn't this his job?"

"He's too busy!" Sally said. "He's got a very important job! He can't be bothered to-"

"What? Oversee us?" the pregnant French woman demanded hotly.

"You've both proven that you can't be trusted," Nymphadora Tonks said. "You keep harassing us with your rules and your klaxons. Then you try to use force against us when we refuse to comply? And you're surprised we're upset? Honestly, it's like Delores Umbridge on polyjuice."

The few who had the misfortune to have encountered that particular witch snorted in bemused agreement.

"You've proven you can't be trusted with power in the what? Eighteen hours we've known you? Less for those of us who weren't on the bus?" Mary Davis snapped. "You don't deserve your position if you can't use it right."

"With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility!" shouted one comic reading kid, one of the American imports. A number of other kids that didn't really follow the conversation understood that line at least.

"Exactly, kid," Nymphadora said, ruffling up his hair playfully.

"So, why don't you explain to these kids, one on one, exactly why you kidnapped them?" Andromeda growled. She cut the woman off with a glare as Sally tried to summon up a denial. "Someone took them away from their parents. You helped with the crime, so part of your punishment is to help these children heal."

"You can't do this! I was chosen for this position specifically by Vault-Tech!"

"And we've chosen to ignore that," Katie Bell commented with a wry smile. A number of others nodded in agreement. "Which is why Harry is going to get the computer codes from 'Maxie' when you're busy with the kiddos."

"Then you'll-"

"Have total control over the vault," Katie replied. "While not everyone here is quite as in tune with the muggle world, I've always been careful to keep up with tech during the summers away from school."

"Tech? Kompooters?" Elijah asked in a whisper to his wife.

"Thinking muggle library... sort of," Mary explained. "Also like a muggle version of a ward scheme."

"How-" he started to ask, but Mary put a hand to his lips.

"Later."

Harry opened the flap, now fully dressed in his jumpsuit, quickly followed by a book reading Hermione.

"What am I doing?" he asked.

"Harry Potter, everyone! Always willing to help out!" Katie explained, waving towards him like she was a stage show magician calling up an assistant. "Harry, I was just explaining how you were going to get the computer codes from the Overseer so we can have control over our own destinies."

"I was?" Harry asked dryly.

"Can't be harder than that Basilisk you killed when you were twelve?" Katie commented. A number of the other magicals snorted in disbelief, thinking it was a joke. Tracey was particularly deriding in her expression. She glanced up when she heard Penelope Clearwater, Helen and Menelaus gasp and turn pale.

"Katie," Hermione said, not looking up from her book. "Don't joke about that."

"Why not? It's dead, isn't it?" she asked. Hermione sighed, marked and closed her book, walked into the tent and pulled out a few photos the Grangers had taken when they went to visit Hogwarts. She passed them to Katie. "Holy shit!"

The first photo was of Harry, Hermione and Penelope standing uncomfortably in front of the monster's carcass, nervously shifting side to side. Even years deceased, the cadaverous snake dwarfed the three of them. It's skull alone was taller than Harry could ever hope to be.

"Okay, so a lot less difficult than killing the basilisk," a white faced Katie amended, passing the photos to Blaise who was peeking over her shoulder. His eyes went wide, glancing between Harry and the photo. He passed it to Tracey who had a sudden feeling of regret for her words the night before.

"Jinkies," Daphne blurted when she realized the fangs were as long as her sister was tall.

"Hermione, I didn't want to make a big deal about it," Harry told his best friend. "You know I don't like the attention."

"Harry, they'll continue to make snide comments and jokes at your expense if they don't know what really happened," Hermione replied, opening her book back up. "You'd think they got the picture when you out-flew a dragon at only fourteen, but apparently that wasn't enough for them."

"Dragons are real? Cool!" one boy about six exclaimed. "Didja kill it?"

"Uh, no, I just needed an egg from its nest," Harry said uncomfortably. "So, Overseer? Office, right. I'll be back."

"Don't feel bad about getting a little dirty," Katie said. He looked at her funny, but shook his head as he wore a frown. She paused and seemed to shrink slightly. "If you need to, I mean."

Turning, Harry quickly left the field, the shocked looks of people following him as he made his escape.

"JEEZUS H CHRIST! THAT'S A BIG SNAKE!" one of the few Americans exclaimed. "He killed this? At _twelve_?"

"With a sword," Hermione expanded, without looking up from her book.

"What is he, King Arthur?" Dean Thomas's mother asked when she saw the pictures.

"More like Sigurd slaying Fafnir," Bjorn Dalen commented.

"You know, it's one thing to hear the rumors and something else to see the evidence," Dean said. "I think I owe Harry an apology."

"Thank you, Mr. Thomas, he'll appreciate that," Helen replied. At his confused look, she smiled. "I'm Hermione's mother and your name is on your jumpsuit."

"Oh," he said.

"_Holy shite_," Tracey muttered under her breath where only Daphne and Astoria could hear her. "_Holy shite_," she said again, on the verge of hyperventilating. Mary leaned over her daughter's shoulder.

"I do believe that's a double portion of humble pie, my dear daughter," Tracey's mother commented. "Serves you right for playing a two-faced game. Think about that because we'll be having a conversation about what you were really like at school."

"It is most disconcerting to find everything I knew about Potter to be severely skewed," Astoria admitted as humbly as she possibly could manage.

"Nymphadora?" her mother asked, holding out one of the photos. The auror just shook her head.

"No, I've seen the real thing," Nymphadora replied, motioning for her mother to pass the picture along. "Much more impressive in real life."

"What?"

"Dumbledore wanted me, Bill and Moody to make sure the Chamber was safe for occupation after he managed to break the enchantments on the doors," Tonks explained. "It's much, _much _more impressive in person. You can't see it in this picture, but it's about sixteen meters long, and that's after decomposition."

"It's almost more scary dead than it was seeing it alive," Penelope replied. "Of course, the first time I saw it, it was through a mirror so I only saw teeth and eyes."

"So all that business about the Chamber of Secrets opening was true?" Ted asked his daughter.

"Oh, yes, Lucius Malfoy cursed Molly and Arthur's girl and she opened it up when under Malfoy's control," Nymphadora explained. "He was trying to use her life force to revive his master."

"Master?" one of the few muggle parents asked.

"His master is one of the most evil and dangerous dark wizards to ever exist in Britain," said the pregnant French woman. "Calls himself something stupid, too. 'Flight from Death' or something similarly idiotic."

"It's an acronym of his real name," Hermione put in. "Tom Marvolo Riddle. If you rearrange the letters it spells out 'I am Lord Voldemort.'"

Those not in the know spotted the shivers of those that were instantly.

"His cultists are called Death Eaters," Andromeda put in getting over her involuntary shiver at the name.

"So some kind of terrorist group?" someone asked, obviously one who was not at the meeting the previous night.

"Yes, and primarily a hate group," Hermione explained. "Voldemort- oh stop that! -Voldemort is back, which is one of the reasons Harry, I and others smuggled people back in, even if the bombs don't fall."

"And that Harry kid," the American said, pointing a thumb in the direction the teen had left, "stopped him?"

"Several times," Hermione noted a number of the adults confused as to why a boy was fighting instead of trained adults. "It's been almost a yearly event." She crossed her arms. "Harry doesn't like standing out. He's probably going to be pretty mad at me for doing this. I decided to set the record straight before the rumors started." She glared pointedly at Tracey, who seemed to shrink under her gaze. "He does these things because other people won't. He doesn't do them for the attention. He doesn't like the spotlight. Unfortunately for good and for ill, the spotlight likes Harry. So before anyone here starts calling him a villain or anything else, I wanted to set the record straight."

She closed her book and held it in both hands in front of her.

"Don't treat him like he's a celebrity," Hermione instructed. "He doesn't like it. He's just Harry. If he sees a problem, he'll step in if he's able to help, but he's not doing it for fame. No matter what some morons might think."

Dean Thomas coughed something that sounded suspiciously like "Snape." He glanced up. "Sorry, just some scum that needs to be cleared out."

"Right, so don't treat Harry Potter like he's the second coming of Jesus," Andromeda stated, keeping a hand on Sally's shoulder to keep her from fleeing. "Just treat him like he's a kid. But first, I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm hungry and eggs sound like a good idea."

Most of them started towards the cafeteria, but Helen and Menelaus pulled their daughter to the side.

"Harry isn't going to like that," Helen said.

"I just got so tired about people making jokes about everything he's been through!" Hermione protested. "They've got no idea about what it cost him! Merlin! They don't even realize that they have a feast on the day his parents were murdered."

"Feast?"

"Halloween," Hermione explained. "He's had people laughing about him, joking about every little thing he did or had done to him."

"I take it whatever happened last night is a big part of this?" Menelaus asked. "Don't try to deny it, Hermione, I'm your father and I've learned your moods. Don't you remember how shocked we were when Harry spilled the beans about what you went through?"

"Yes, but what does-" Helen cut her off.

"Do you know what it was like for us when we realized what had gone on? When we finally understood why you didn't write the last few weeks of your second year? Or when we found out a murderer had been impersonating your self-defense professor? Or your friend's pet?" Helen asked. "We were alarmed, shocked and in an incredible amount of denial at first. It was too big. We didn't really start to believe until Professor Dumbledore allowed us to visit. When you and Harry were talking to your other professors, Madame Pomphrey and that little guy, um, Derby?"

"Dobby," Hermione corrected.

"Right," Menelaus said. "Your mother and I had a long talk with your headmaster about what had been going on. We think he was honest about it. A part of me wonders if he was just honest about it because he knew you were going to be safely tucked away in here, but he didn't try to cover up the danger you've been in. Only then did we really believe it had happened."

"Well, the Chamber was the first shock to the system," Helen explained with a grimace at the memory. "But the point we're trying to make is that most of those people had only heard things second, third or even fourth hand. You might hate gossip, but it's a fact of life. Every society has gossip. Some people have a very difficult time believing what they hear for that very reason."

"So when they heard Harry killed a big snake, they were probably thinking of 'big' as the size of an arm," Menelaus explained. "You were well intentioned, but I think this was not the best way to deal with the situation. You didn't even discuss it with Harry. Taking initiative is good at times, but not all the time."

"I just-"

"Hermione, we're not mad at you, we just wanted you to see another side of the coin," Helen said. "Do you understand? When Harry gets back, maybe you could have a talk about this with him."

Hermione nodded, but clearly a bit depressed by the conversation.

"Now, what say you we unpack some of our things?" Menelaus suggested with a warm smile. "I was half way through that book and I really want to finish it up."


	12. Chapter 12

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

Chapter 12

By DireSquirrel

.

While all this was happening, Harry was making his way through the Vault corridors to the Overseer's office. He knew it was near the entrance, but he didn't really know his way around yet. After some false starts, finding three lavatories, four laboratories and the med center, he finally made his way back to the site of the previous night's confrontation. Lights low, sitting at his desk, the Overseer was eating pudding from a cup as he reached over his large belly to tap on the computer keyboard in front of him.

Harry pursed his lips in thought, pausing to observe the man through the window for a little while. The man giggled at something he read and Harry decided it was time for the confrontation. Harry slapped the control on the door and stepped into the doorway.

"Overseer," Harry said, "We need to talk."

Maximillian Barker looked up in surprise, his eyes going wide. Back-lit from the hall, his visitor's face was hidden in shadows save for his glasses, which reflected the sharp green of the terminal.

Sitting down on the other side of the desk, the visitor rested his elbows on the desk in front of him, steepleing his hands in front of his face, making the terminal light glint dangerously off his glasses.

"Gendo Ikari?" Maxie asked in horror, spilling his pudding on his protruding middle.

"I'm afraid I don't know who you mean," Harry said in a low, emotionless voice. "But that's not important right now. How about you tell me everything you know about this vault. And I mean everything from your command computer codes to true intent of Vault UK-13."

Maxie glanced at the security button on his desk. He knew the Protectrons could be there soon, but it might not be soon enough.

"Tell me, Overseer," Harry said, the light still glinting off his specs. "Do you feel lucky?"

"What?" Maxie asked.

"It's a simple question," Harry said. "You're wondering if the robots can get here in time. You know I took two of them out last night. Sure, they didn't have much damage aside from falling, but I still incapacitated them for a time. Now, are you faster than me? When you call them, how many would it take for me to be overpowered? You have the button. You know what they can do. You've seen _something_ I can do. You're wondering if that was a one time thing or if I can do it again. So you have to ask yourself 'Do I feel lucky?'"

Maxie glanced at Harry then down at the button. He raised his hand and Harry's hand was up. Maxie froze, his eyes locked on the glowing tip of Harry Potter's wand. "Go ahead, Overseer. Make my day."

The wand, glowing, aimed perfectly between his eyes, Maxie decided he wasn't that lucky and lowered his arm.

Harry's entire posture changed. He became relaxed and wore a smile.

"Well done, Overseer," Harry said. "Now, let's talk about those codes."

Maximillian leaned back in his chair. He'd stay on top. He just had to adapt.

* * *

"That's a lumos!" Senior Undersecretary Delores Umbridge exclaimed, staring at the parchment that recorded Harry Potter's underage sorcery. "Why can't we find Potter? Why hasn't he been caught?"

"We don't know, Madame Umbridge," Auror Dawlish asked. "Every letter heads out on it's trip, but something keeps them from reaching their destination. The same for all those other statute violations we've recorded."

"I don't care about the others, I just care about _Potter_!" the pink clad woman snarled.

"As an auror, I'm required to investigate them all, Undersecretary," Dawlish replied.

"Then start doing your job!" Umbridge bellowed as she stormed out of the room. When the door slammed behind her, Dawlish let out a deep breath. He immediately cranked up the wireless to a louder volume as Amelia Bones released her disillusionment charm.

"Well done, Dawlish," Bones said.

"Thank you, Director," he said, slumping into his seat. "I don't understand what this is all about. Why is the Ministry so concerned about minor violations, none of which, according to the devices, are actually breaking the statute? When did children become such an issue, even if one is Potter?"

"They shouldn't be, no matter who they are," Bones clarified. "It's just a continuation of what they've been doing in the Prophet: libel, slander and defamation of character. If she does anything out of the ordinary, I want to know immediately. If I for whatever reason am not available, inform Shacklebolt."

"Yes, Director," Dawlish agreed.

"And forget to mention this assignment to Scrimgeour," Bones instructed. "These are dangerous times, after all."

"Oh, yes, I understand," Dawlish said. "But do I really have to..."

"Pretend to be a sycophant?"

He nodded.

"While distasteful, it is, unfortunately, necessary," Bones admitted. "I just got word from Tonks this morning, your two children and your wife are safe in the vault. Apparation is currently impossible, due to some unknown wards Arthur's eldest put up. I'm not willing to test portkeys with people. I should be able to connect you with a new form of communication."

"Communication? You mean like a floo there?"

Bones shook her head.

"Better for communication," she said, pulling out a mirror. "Two way mirrors. You activate them, say who you want to speak to, so long as they have a mirror, and it creates a connection between them. If you're unavailable, it will take a message, like a longer photograph with sound, nothing more than thirty seconds at a time. Best of all, no back pain from stooping over."

"That's..." Dawlish trailed off, impressed by the creation. If released to the public, it would revolutionize magical communication.

"James Potter and his friends invented them when they were in Hogwarts," Bones explained. Dawlish grimaced.

"People forget how much we lost when You-Know-Who killed them," Dawlish replied sadly. "We didn't like their pranks, but no one could deny they were brilliant. A shame what happened. James and Lily dead, Lupin vanishing, Black killing Pettigrew."

"And no one _really_ knows what happened," Bones grumbled. She snorted in derision at his surprised look. "Oh, we've got the legends about that night, but no real evidence other than hearsay."

"But who's making the mirrors now?"

"I'm not sure, but my suspicions say it's the bird club," Bones replied. "Not that I would know anything about that."

"Oh, yes, shame we are completely ignorant of that," Dawlish agreed. He sighed. "Thank you. It means a lot to know they are safe and that I'll be able to talk to them sometime. Elspeth just started first year, Ravenclaw, first in the family as far as I can recall. If she was there when Umbridge was..." He paused and let his shoulders slump. "I'd be dancing to her tune if I liked it or not." He looked up. "Thank you. Really."

"Susan's there as well. I wouldn't expect anyone else to do what I was not willing to do myself," Amelia replied. "I have to get back to my office. Remember, Auror, _anything_ out of the ordinary."

"Yes, Director," he agreed with a nod. He waited for her to cast another disillusionment charm before opening the door, making a big show of stretching out his arms and muscles, giving her plenty of time to slip out. He followed, locking his door behind him. He turned the corner and noticed Lucius Malfoy lurking outside the Minister's office. Schooling his face into normalcy, he kept walking, not even glancing in the Death Eater's direction. As he passed, he was almost painfully aware of the man's attention, but made sure nothing in his bearing showed weakness.

A moment later, the door opened with both Umbridge and Fudge. Distracted by the impending political manipulation, Lucius Malfoy never noticed the invisible tracking spell Dawlish hit him with before the auror vanished into the busy mass of ministry paper pushers.

* * *

As the Mr. Handy robots were cleaning up the remains of breakfast, Andromeda leaned over to her daughter.

"What happened with Snape last night? I couldn't help but notice he wasn't there to irritate us all this morning," she asked.

"Oh, I locked him in here," Nymphadora said, tapping the locket. "It was the only place I knew he couldn't get out of without my help."

"Good thinking," her mother said. "This was the reason I asked you to deal with him. I trust you to make the right decisions."

"Thanks mum," Nymphadora said with a little smile. It vanished at the next thought. "I guess I should let him out. He's been leaving message after message on my mirror all morning." She paused. "I haven't watched any of them, maybe a mistake on my part. It's probably because he finally realized I palmed his wand before he went in."

"_Ha!_ See, Andy, I _told_ you those muggle magic lessons would come in handy," Ted said smugly, looking like he had just won the greatest debate of the universe.

"Whatever," his wife muttered with a roll of her eyes with a ghost of a smile on her lips. "I suppose we should let him out."

"I saw a nice place to set up the flat on a more permanent basis over by the security office," Nymphadora said.

"Let's go let him out," her mother said, setting her napkin down on the table. "It's always a pleasure to see that man put in his place."

The Tonks family stood up, nodding to those they knew and made their way out of the large room. They twisted down the corridors until Ted almost ran into Harry coming back from the Overseer's office.

"Wotcher, Harry," Nymphadora said. "We're letting Snape out of his hole, want to watch?"

"Snape's in a hole?"

"In my locket," she explained, holding up the item. "Like your tents."

"Ah," Harry said. He shrugged, not wanting to see lots of people. "Sure, why not."

"We're setting it up down here," she said, pointing to the corridor that separated the living quarters from the laboratories and security station.

"Like Ollivander's shop?" he asked.

"Yeah, good work convincing him to come," Nymphadora said. Harry shrugged as if it wasn't much.

"All I said was that Voldemort was probably looking for him," Harry argued.

"I'd say that would make most people want to hide in a hole in the ground," Ted admitted after getting over the shiver at the name. Harry just shrugged as if he didn't have an opinion one way or another.

The four of them walked down the hall to the very end. It was a bit of an alcove that had no other apparent purpose. Tonks opened the locket and went through much the same process as Hermione did when enlarging Ollivander's shop, without the unfolding. She tapped the little box twice, allowing it to grow to its normal two meter size. She tapped the doors once, allowing them to swing wide.

The scene they found inside made all of them freeze.

"You know," Harry said. "I was starting to think this was going to be a pretty crappy day." He stroked his chin in thought. "Neville, thanks for proving me wrong."

"Harry?" Neville asked, glancing at the door without actually turning his head or letting his wand fall. Keeping perfectly still in his rage, Severus Snape, still dressed in his tutu, tiara and ballet shoes, looked about ready to go into a berserk rage.

"I was just getting my plants when he appeared! I thought he was a boggart!" Neville explained in a strained voice. Harry looked closer and saw the bags under his friend's eyes.

"Did you get any sleep at all?" Harry asked.

"Could you sleep with Snape in the room?" Neville asked pointedly, his wand never wavering.

"You can relax, Longbottom," Nymphadora said, struggling to keep from laughing. "I'll take over. You go get some sleep."

"You sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure," the metamorphic witch assured, pulling out her wand. Hesitantly, Neville lowered his wand.

"Come on, Nev, I'll walk back with you," Harry said, grinning widely. He looked right at Snape the Pink with a smirk. The older man bristled with constrained rage. "I think we need to tell everyone about this. A shame I didn't think to take a camera."

"That just means we need to describe it perfectly to Dean so he can draw it," Neville said in uncharacteristic humor. Harry suspected it was the lack of sleep.

"Yes," Harry said. "I think that's a great idea."

Andy and Ted were shaking with silent laughter as they watched the boys vanish around a corner.

"My wand?" Snape demanded, holding out his hand. Nymphadora squinted at him as she pondered the request.

"I think you'll get it back once we get back to the cafeteria," she decided, prompting Snape's normally pallid complexion to gain some color, albeit by anger.

"Oh, you have no idea, no idea at all, how much this means to me," Andromeda said, her eyes sparkling with mirth. "I know you liked to play the put-upon little victim to James Potter and his pranks, but I know the truth."

"Black! You're no different from your cousin!" Snape snapped, intending it as an insult.

"Why? Because we could both think for ourselves? You deserve this, Snape," Andromeda said flatly. "You treated an entire generation of children like crap, while buttering up your play buddies by favoring their spawn. Did you think you were immune to retribution?"

"Andy," Ted said lowly in a warning tone as he rested a hand on her shoulder. "Love, are you sure this is a good idea?"

His wife shook off his hand, keeping her glare on Snape.

"Do you even remember why James and Sirius started after you? You've probably convinced yourself that you were innocent, a victim," Andromeda said, with a derisive laugh. "Do you happen to remember Hyacinth Urquhart? Little Cin, we used to call her? Slytherin, same year as you?" She took a half step forward. "No, I can see it in your eyes that you don't. Lovely kid, wanted to be head of Sports and Games. Loved Quidditch. Had some real ambition, that one."

Nymphadora looked at her mother in amazement. The only other time she'd seen a dressing down like this one was when she'd been playing on the train tracks near their house as a kid. Ted, on the other hand, had seen what Snape had done to those who, in the potion master's delusions, had slighted him.

"Little Cin accidentally messed up on the potion she was brewing in the Slytherin practice room. Ringing any bells now? No?" Andromeda asked, her voice growing harsh. "You made some choice comments about her talent, or perceived lack thereof. She didn't take it well. Called you a greasy git, I think. Now, you didn't like that did you? So you messed with her next potion when she wasn't looking. Added Essence of Mandrake. That taught her, didn't it? When combined with the potion she was brewing, as you, the most skilled and knowledgeable potions student to come out of Slytherin since Slughorn himself, knew Essence of Mandrake would cause noxious fumes. Those fumes, when inhaled require very swift treatment. But she didn't know this, all she knew was that another potion failed."

"She never went for treatment. By the time the shivers in her hands started it was too late, _weeks_ late. It was just a slight unsteadiness at first," Andromeda recalled. "She came to me for help with a few first year spells and I noticed the shaking of her hand. We went to the hospital wing where Madame Pomphrey discovered what had happened. Little Cin knew she had never used Essence of Mandrake in any potion she brewed. She never finished first year since every muscle in her body was constantly moving. And there was no cure."

Andromeda gritted her teeth in rage as she struggled to keep from physically strangling the man in front of her. "Nothing will convince me you didn't know what would happen. You were just too skilled not to know. She's still alive, did you know that?" Andromeda growled at him wordlessly. "That's why I became a healer. I wanted to help her meet her ambitions. Nothing ever worked. She's still there, three beds down from Frank and Alice Longbottom. Not far from that fake Lockhart. In bed, shivering constantly as if being shaken. Prevented from walking, moving with intention, even speaking since the movements could shatter her teeth if she was allowed to live without the subduing charms."

Her eyes squinted.

"_That_ was when James and Sirius started after you,"

"_You_," Snape said. "You set that dog on me? _You_ did all this?"

"I did _nothing_, you miserable cretin," she replied. "Don't you dare blame this on me, because you won't win. They were in the hospital wing looking after that other friend of theirs, the scruffy one. What was his name? Reemy or something."

"Remus," Nymphadora supplied. A bit horrified by what Snape had done.

"Thank you dear, Remus," Andromeda said. "They just happened to be there when Little Cin got the news. Little Cin explained what had happened with her failed potion. Potter and my cousin came to the same conclusion I did, you had sabotaged the potion. It wasn't jealousy over Evans or any other self-delusion you might keep; it was because you ruined a little girl's life."

Snape sneered at her, clear to everyone present that he dismissed her story.

"There wasn't enough evidence, so you never got punished for it," Andromeda said. "I think Dumbledore put it as 'there's no need to ruin a young man's career on speculation.' I'm sure Nymphadora remembers how much I paid attention to her health before and after each term."

"Full health check, sure I remember," Nymphadora agreed. "Last of August, at Christmas, Spring Break, then in June when I got home."

"I wanted to make sure you never did to her what you did to Little Cin. I'm sure there are plenty who suffered under your '_care_,'" she spat the last word so it was dripping with sarcasm.

"Many I'm sure don't even realize it's your fault," Andromeda explained to the vile greasy man. "It was no surprise to me when you joined up with the Death Eaters. Not a surprise at all. Sure, it was to a few people considering you were once friends with Evans, but you saw her as a possession, not as a person. Not a surprise to me."

"What _was_ a surprise to me was Albus Dumbledore's greatest mistake: trusting you. Saving you from Azkaban..." Andromeda growled like a wolverine being poked with a stick. She shook her head in disbelief. "Then he made you Slughorn's replacement. Though my ancestor Phineas Nigellus still reigns supreme as the most hated Headmaster in history, you quickly supplanted him as the most hated professor."

"You should have never been allowed around children," Ted agreed.

"I don't think you should be allowed around _anyone_," Andromeda argued. "But Dumbledore chose _you_ to replace Slughorn."

"I never advanced far in St. Mungo's thanks to my worm of a brother-in-law's money," Andromeda explained. "I never had the political clout to force my way onto the Board of Governors. I was never able to dismiss you from Hogwarts. But you're not at Hogwarts any more, Severus Snape. You're here."

"And you're trapped here with me," Snape sneered.

"No, you've got it backwards, Snape," Andromeda said with a cruel smile. "_You_ are trapped in here with _me_. And I'm not going to let you get away with what you did at Hogwarts. I had to give Nymphadora special lessons in potions because you never explained _why_ things happened, just a simple list of commands. Cooking lessons at best, not potions instruction. The way you taught was no different from a baker making bread. Who needs to know _why_ the dough rises, it just does?"

"You won't be teaching here. You won't be interacting with children. You will be watched all the time. And if you screw up?" Andy said. "UK-13 will have it's first execution. You can consider yourself on permanent probation."

"You know, I just remembered Snape saying there was no silly wand waving in potion making, so there's no reason to give him his wand back, right, Mum?" Nymphadora asked.

"No reason at all," Andromeda agreed. The older woman made a motion for him to start walking. "Move along."

Her daughter prodded the potion master ahead with a stinging hex. Snape glared at Andromeda as Nymphadora marched him forward. He was swearing revenge for the indignity.

"Oh, and if you think you'll be able to taint opinions against Mr. Potter, I'll be sure to tell them the truth about you," Andromeda called after them. She could see the man shiver with impotent rage.

"Are you sure that was wise?" Ted asked her. "Embracing your inner Gryffindor like that?"

"Gryffindor? Oh no, that was pure Slytherin stick," Andromeda replied. "He already ate the carrot Dumbledore gave him, so there's no reason to offer more. But wise? No, probably not. For decades I've thought about this day. And he's here, at my mercy."

"You're starting to sound a little too much like your sister at the moment, Andy," cautioned Ted, pulling her into a hug. "You can kick the girl out of the Blacks, but you can't take the Black out of the girl, huh?"

"No, I suppose not," she said as she rested her chin on his shoulder. "You were the only other one I ever told. No one else ever heard the whole story. Not with Dumbledore covering things up. Can't have a scandal at Hogwarts, now can we?"

They paused as they heard the cheers and wolf whistles from ahead. Both elder Tonks smiled.

"Nymphadora must have made it to the meeting," Ted commented. He quickly sobered. "You know he's planning a counter attack."

"I'm counting on it," Andy said, looking her husband straight in the eyes. "I'm serious, one mistake and he's out. Red card, no yellow. I've never taken a life. My oaths as a healer prevent me from doing harm. But giving him free rein _is_ doing harm. I'd rather lose my magic for executing him than let him poison anyone else, mentally or physically."

"We need to be careful," Ted reminded her, holding her gently at arms length.

"We need to watch Longbottom closely," Andy said. "If I'm right about him, he'll blame Longbottom for this whole situation, pink dressing up and the verbal dressing down. Snape will try to target him first."

"Neville was terrified by him," Ted commented. "But he didn't back down, even when he realized he had the real Severus Snape at wand point."

"That only worked because Snape was missing his wand," Andy reminded him. "Longbottom might already be dead if our dear daughter had not the foresight to disarm that monster."

"What are we going to do with him? We know he can't be trusted and it's just a matter of time before he tries something," Ted said in exasperation as they made their way towards the room they spent the night in. "That's not the only thing we need to do. What the hell were the muggles thinking?"

"It's a breeding program," they turned to see Harry Potter standing behind them. "That's what this entire vault is for. The information was on the Overseer's computer."

"So you got the codes?" Ted asked. "How'd you manage to get 'Maxie' to help?"

"Strangely easy to intimidate," Harry explained. "All I did was sit down and ask him if he really wanted to call the robots. A moment later, he's telling me everything from the computer codes to the time he stole a comic from a bully in primary school."

"A breeding program? Explain," Andromeda said. She was all business, brow furrowed, her arms crossed over her chest. Harry shrugged.

"Apparently the muggles recorded images and videos of accidental magic and a whole bunch of wizards and witches breaking the Statute of Secrecy. The Overseer thought they were psychics, but considering who's here, I assume they meant accidental magic," he explained. "Street cameras, building security, recorded testimony from before Obliviators arrived. Then the muggles involved wouldn't remember anything even when it had happened right before their eyes. It raised flags. Everyone who was assigned here is either psychic -magical- or a latent -squib- by their definition."

"Their definition?"

"Genetic testing," Harry said. "Hermione was right when she guessed about the blood test."

"Muggles can tell who is and isn't a wizard or witch by testing blood?" Andromeda asked in fascination. "Sorry, I'm a healer, we don't even know how to do that. We just wait for accidental magic to manifest and if it doesn't, for the Hogwarts letters to arrive. I didn't even know it was possible."

"Well, for muggles it is, I guess. Apparently there's only a very, very small difference between a magical and a squib," Harry said. "And it's not that they aren't magical, they're just missing a very small piece that gives them enough to use."

"Why don't more squibs give birth to magical children then?" Andy asked.

"There was something about that too, something about how most muggles have so few of the genes, the pieces that make someone magic that it's very unlikely," Harry said. "I don't really understand it. It had to do with a lot of terms I didn't understand. Some, like genetics and chromosomes I've heard of, but I don't know enough of how they work. The muggles basically thought if squibs had kids with magicals their kids could be magical, but it would be like a fifty-fifty chance."

"And since squibs are considered failures, they are rarely married to witches and wizards," Andromeda supplied. "I need more on this."

Harry shrugged again and shot a thumb back over his shoulder towards the Overseer's office. "You can read it, it's on the computer in the Overseer's office."

"This is amazing, but the purpose of the vault?" Ted said, bringing them back to the conversation.

"Oh, right, well, only a few adults to pass on the skills and a bunch of teenagers to make babies," Harry summed up with a shrug. "The Overseer, who's also a genetic squib, but not born in the Wizarding World, was to ensure that we'd be loyal to muggle Britain, not the Ministry of Magic."

"And the kids? Why so many from other countries?"

"They're all muggleborns, or squibs genetically," Harry said. "If my guess is right, I mean. They all tested for magic or a high likeliness of passing magic to their children. A lot more than we saw at Hogwarts, like 20 per year just in Britain. Makes me wonder why we only had a handful."

"Either we're missing them, or they don't live long enough," Andy guessed. Harry looked shocked at how blasé she appeared. Ted looked like he was almost ready to cry. She just shook her head ruefully. "Death Eaters didn't go completely silent when their master died, they just stopped dressing up. I wouldn't be surprised if the kids were tracked down and killed."

"That's horrible," Harry exclaimed, revolted by the prospect.

"Yes, well, that describes the Death Eaters," Andromeda Tonks replied. "I'm the only one in my family that didn't jump on that bandwagon."

"You remember what Nymphadora said about your cousin," Ted reminded her. She just shrugged.

"I've only got her word about Sirius, no evidence,"

"You're Sirius's cousin!" Harry said, brightening, his previous dower mood vanishing almost completely. "He's innocent! Really!"

"What? How do you know this?" Andromeda asked.

"My third year, he wasn't after me, he was after my friend's rat, which was really Pettigrew, who was the real one to betray my parents," Harry explained. "Sirius was thrown in jail without a trial. He broke out to clear his name, but Wormtail escaped."

"Wormtail?" both Tonks asked in confusion.

"Pettigrew's Marauder nickname, like Sirius is Padfoot, Remus is Moony, and my dad was Prongs," Harry explained. "Wait, that means you're the only other good Black that he was talking about."

"I wouldn't describe my wife as 'good' but she isn't unrepentantly evil like most her family," Ted said, giving Andy a playful bump with his hips. She smirked and slapped him on the shoulder.

"So, Sirius Black is innocent," Andromeda mused. "But back to the vault."

"The idea was we'd all be loyal to Britain, safe from the Ministry and away from Hogwarts," Harry explained. "That's why the med center has a huge baby ward."

"I take it they didn't know about the wands?" Ted asked.

"They figured it was a... placebo, I think they called it. I don't know what that means. They expected us to develop our "psychic" powers outside of the Wizarding World," Harry said. "It sounded like Downing Street wasn't too happy with the last couple wars or any other time magicals interfered with or killed muggles. If what you're talking about the Malfoys and others is right, I guess I can't blame the Prime Minister for feeling that way."

"I need to read this," Andromeda said. "I need to know about this blood test, and I want to see the hospital."

"It's genetics," Harry said. "They cover it a little in primary, but I went to Hogwarts so I don't really know much more than that it makes us what we are. And um... everything has it. I bet if you talk to Helen and Menelaus, they could tell you more. They're dentists." He grinned at Andromeda's confused look and Ted's obvious amusement. "Tooth healers," he added.

"Who are they?"

"The Grangers, Hermione's parents," he explained. Harry looked up at them. "That's pretty much what the plan for our vault was. Now, though, I guess we could open the door, but I'm not sure what would happen if we did."

"We could try to return a few of these kids back to their parents," Andromeda mused.

"Unless they're in Vaults as well," Harry said. "Be a bit harder."

"And it would leave us open to attack," Ted agreed. Harry nodded. "Well, let's go deal with one thing at a time. Sleeping accommodations first, Snape, then this breeding experiment."

"Are we leaving the Overseer in charge?" Harry asked. "Because he seemed pretty spineless if Sally isn't there with him."

"I don't think I can put my trust in a single all powerful leader anymore," Andromeda replied, she sighed and crossed her arms as they pondered the situation for a moment. "Later. Politics always make tempers rise. Let's go deal with the beds."

* * *

"So the basics of the sleeping arrangements," Elijah began. While the Tonks were dealing with Snape, the Davises gathered anyone thirteen and older into one of the larger classrooms to go over the vault situation. "We have just barely enough beds large enough for teens and adults. We're good on child sized beds, not even half full."

"Could we combine two into a larger one?" Katie Belle asked. "Because, no offense to any of you girls, I like my own bed."

Elijah grinned as a few people chuckled.

"And the only woman I want to sleep with is my wife," he agreed. "Which is why, if the Grangers and Mr. Potter agree, married or dedicated couples and families can live in the tents until we can make our own private flats."

"I didn't see a lot of extra space or spare materials, how are you planning on doing this?" Bjorn Dalen asked.

"Not a wizard?"

"I chose to go to University instead," Bjorn replied, earning a number of scandalized looks from the other magicals. He huffed at the shock he caused.

"You saw the magic tents, correct?" Elijah asked, recovering the quickest.

"Fascinating," Bjorn agreed. "Though a part of me still refuses to believe it is magic."

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," Menelaus' step-father said with a chuckle.

"And any sufficiently explained magic is indistinguishable from technology," Menelaus countered.

"Touche, my son, touche," the old man said.

"Yes, we can, through a series of spells, runes and enchantments, make a container larger inside than it should be by outward dimensions," Mary explained. "That's a bit of a simplification, but we can actually make rooms through magic and it should not be much issue to connect them with the power and water systems we currently have."

"Of course, with a wand, water isn't an issue," Blaise Zabini said, sitting next to his mother. "One simple spell, voila, fresh water."

"We can also, once the couples and families move into the tents, turn some of the other rooms into actual flats," Elijah said.

"How many tents did Harry and Hermione buy?" someone asked.

"Don't quote me on this, but every single one in Diagon Alley," Helen said with a chuckle that was echoed by many others.

"We do need to move the other supplies they brought to vault storage," Dean suggested, "though we should really be talking about this when they're right here."

"I agree," Elijah replied with a nod. "But, we won't be finalizing anything here, just brainstorming."

"Since Hermione spent our money on a lot of it, we can agree for some of it, but not for Harry's stuff," Helen volunteered. "She doesn't need all those tents. If they can be better used by other people, then go for it. Each one has a full flat from stove to ice box, not a refrigerator, at least two rooms, sometimes more."

"That still leaves the issue of where to put the things they bought," Penelope pointed out. "And there's the fact that Harry brought a whole bunch of animals. Which we should probably let out sooner rather than later."

"Animals?" someone asked.

"Owls and Kneazles, and a pair of talking goats," Helen supplied. "They didn't want Hedwig or Crookshanks to be lonely, though I'm not sure why he bought the goats."

"How many?"

"A lot," Penelope answered. "I'm sure they'd be willing to spread them around a bit."

Astoria immediately turned to her mother. "May I have a Kneasle?"

"What are kneazles?" someone asked.

"Magical cats that are almost as smart as people," someone answered.

"And why the owls?" Bjorn inquired.

"We use them for post," Katie answered from beside him.

"Why?" he asked, completely befuddled.

"Just do," she replied. "I don't actually know why."

"There's a lot of books in the tents," Menelaus continued. "From both walks of life since she bought out a number of bookstores with the money we were able to pool."

"How could you possibly have that much to buy out a book store?" Tracey asked, confusion written on her brow.

"If you sell galleons for the gold content and not the exchange value, you can make a massive amount of money in a very short period of time," Penelope explained.

"Why?"

"Because muggles value gold a lot more," Penelope replied. "You can trade in a galleon and get five pounds at Gringott's. Or, you can go to the muggle world and sell a single galleon for hundreds of pounds."

"You sell it for weight? Hundreds of pounds of what?" Zabini's mother asked.

"The name of the local muggle currency is the British Pound," Helen replied. "If you sell one, bring the cash back to Gringott's you started with one coin and ended up with hundreds."

"Wouldn't that break the economy?" her mother asked, a former banker.

"Sure, if you kept it up," Helen agreed, "But they only did it a few times."

"So, as a result of all this, they've got hundreds, if not thousands of books to go to a library," Menelaus explained. "They bought a lot of other things that I don't know about. You'll have to talk to them."

"So, we move the stuff out, move the couples into the tents, split the rest of us up into smaller size rooms," Velma Greengrass summed up. "What are we waiting for?"

"We need to figure out what to do with the children," Mary replied. "Velma, almost all of them were separated from their families to other vaults. They don't even really know where they are. The concept of staying here forever isn't even in the back of their minds. I talked to a couple of boys who thought they were going to have a sleep over party then go home."

"I bet their parents are worried stiff," Hermione's paternal grandmother commented.

"No bet," Mary said, giving her daughter a quick squeeze, much to the girl's embarrassment.

"I know nothing about caring for children," Penelope said. "The youngest I've helped was eleven when I was a prefect and a Headgirl."

"You might be just what we need, Miss Clearwater," Elijah replied. "These kids have effectively been kidnapped and right now we have no way of getting them back to their families. You've dealt with homesick kids before."

"I'll help with the kids," Susan said, raising her hand. A number of others raised their hands as well.

"Good," Mary said. "How about the rest of us go find Miss Granger and Mr. Potter to clean out the tent?"

There were a few sounds of agreement. The meeting wrapped up just in time for Nymphadora to guide Snape by in all his glory.

"Come one, come all! See Severus Snape: Pretty in Pink!" she said. Dean gave a wolf whistle and a number of other people were cheering at the man's humiliation. Almost anyone who was in not-Slytherin was heckling the man. The Slytherin contingent was trying not to be seen and were doing their best to either blend into the crowd or move quickly behind others. They'd observed the man's wrath in other ways.

"See, Nev, it's not so bad," Harry said as he walked in with the Longbottom boy. "Just because he ended up not to be a boggart, doesn't mean your spell has to go to waste."

"I guess," Neville agreed, barely awake. Without having the threat right in front of him, exhaustion had quickly taken its toll on the boy.

"Everyone, we can all thank Neville for today's entertainment," Harry said. "Neville, tell everyone what happened."

"Okay," Neville said after Harry hit him with a spell to wake him up a bit. The Longbottom boy went on to explain everything that happened since last night. By the time he was done, Harry was gone, but Neville had become something of a hero to anyone not-Slytherin who went to school at any time Severus Snape had been in residence either as a student or as a professor. The Slytherins were trying very hard to find a way how not to be associated with the boy for fear of retribution.

"Anyone who is worried about ole Sevie," Tonks reassured, "Don't worry. We're not letting him have a wand. He screws up once and he's out. If you want the whole story, you can talk to my Mum, but to sum up, he's a horrible person who barely deserves to breathe."

Blaise Zabini looked like his eyes were going to pop out of his head. This was the man who had ruled a quarter of Hogwarts, not with an iron fist, but with a silver tongue. Draco Malfoy never would have had the same kind of power if not for Snape's sponsorship. With the sponsorship of Lucius Malfoy and Dumbledore, Snape himself had been ironclad.

Any time there was a dressing down, it wasn't to improve their behavior, it was to shame the child for getting caught. Blaise assumed it had been intended to be a lesson on cunning, but it failed. Resentment grew against the other houses, much worse than the stories his former step-fathers had talked about.

The Snape sponsorship had created blocks of power, all based around Snape's favorites. Draco Malfoy was sponsored because Snape and the elder Lucius Malfoy were both in the same club, Lucius being one of Snape's political shields in larger magical society. Pansy had pushed forward as Malfoy's feminine equal, and had quickly earned sponsorship that first year. Blaise had watched as the others filed in behind her, even if he knew they didn't agree with her voiced messages.

He thought back to the discussion with Granger. She was absolutely right. It had appeared to the rest of the school that all of Slytherin agreed with the open mouths/empty minds of Parkinson and Malfoy. Even he was guilty of that, looking back, because although he was known as a neutral in Slytherin, Slytherins never talked with other houses. How had he been so stupid?

He'd thought for a while that splitting people up by personality type was stupid. When ever you say, this group there, that group here, it created tension. In Hogwarts it created preconceptions. Slytherins were all Death Eater wannabes to all the other houses. In Slytherin, Gryffindors were all blood traitor "light" siders. Hufflepuffs were stupidly loyal, only useful for minions. Ravenclaws weren't worth your time unless you wanted a book.

But it was one thing to think something was stupid and a completely different thing to take a stand different from your own group. He kept thinking about Andromeda Black, well, Tonks now, but she wasn't at Hogwarts. It was all about the individual with her. House loyalty was a stupid concept that was cast aside. Hell, this was a pureblood princess who tossed all that away for one simple reason: she took a stand. And in the end, she was one of the only Blacks left.

It wasn't just Slytherins that seemed to refuse to take a stand. Blaise thought back to how the school had treated Potter on occasion. Even Potter's own house abandoned him when he lost points that first year. At the time Malfoy said it had something to do with a dragon being sent to Weasley's brother, but that didn't make sense as people couldn't own dragons. It was obvious to everyone that the three firsties were getting the cold shoulder from the rest of their house. Looking back at it, especially in consideration of that morning's photo display, Potter had probably lost those points doing something that no one else was willing to do.

He could have never admitted it at school, but Blaise looked up to Potter, just a bit. He wasn't the stereotype of the bullish Gryffindor. He was the archtype of the noble Gryffindor. When something had to be done, Potter did it even if there might have been someone better, not because he wanted the fame, like a Slytherin, or even most people in general, would do. He did it because it needed to be done. Potter didn't let anything stop him.

Blaise looked up and realized Snape was being escorted to his new home, wherever that might be. The people in general were treating Longbottom like a hero. That was almost Slytherin of Potter to deflect the attention from himself like that. Weasley would have stayed right beside Longbottom to try and bask in the praise vicariously. Potter had given all the credit to Longbottom and skipped out.

Blaise Zabini watched as the bedroom group guided Neville to a few hours rest. Blaise stood up alongside his mother. He glanced at her. She rarely spoke in a new group, preferring to watch the dynamics until she understood them. She was calculating, rather cold, but she was still his mother. One aspect of the vault Blaise was going to enjoy was the lack of new stepfather's attempting to kill him off so the new child could be the heir. Outsiders didn't know that the poisonings were always in retaliation, and Blaise never felt the need to inform anyone. Knowing that his mother loved him enough to poison an entire extended magical branch of the Pazzi family was enough.

As part of "everyone else" the Zabini family, all four members, were to unload Granger and Potter's tents so others could move in. Of course, this was all theoretical until someone tracked down Granger and asked her about it. Come to think of it, they needed to track down Potter, since he skipped out when Longbottom showed up.

"Greengrass, let's go find Potter and Granger," he suggested.

"Me?" Daphne asked, shocked at his choice.

"Someone has to," Blaise argued.

"I don't think-"

"Well, now you can," Blaise countered. "You're right, you didn't think. Now you've got a chance to apologize."

"What do you get out of this?" she asked, eyes narrowing at him.

"A chance to prove that we've left Hogwarts behind," he said. He waved for her to follow. "Come along, I'll explain."

"Blaise?"

The teen looked up at the sound of his mother's lilting voice.

"Yes, Mother?"

"Inform Mr. Potter that I would like to speak with him about an owl," she said.

"Of course, Mother."

He hooked Daphne's arm in his own and almost pulled the girl out of the room.

"What was that about?" she demanded when they had finally slowed down.

"It's rarely a good thing when Mother gets interested in a man, though she's never done so with one so young before," Blaise admitted. "I don't relish the idea of Potter being my next stepfather."

"Maybe she just wants an owl?"

Blaise just looked at the girl with one raised eyebrow.

"Fine, it's not just about an owl, yes, why me to find Potter and Granger?" the eldest Greengrass girl asked.

"Because as much as Tracey needs to apologize for being a bitch, I'm not stupid enough to get between your sister and her," the boy replied.

"What?" Daphne said before catching herself and sticking her nose up in the air. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh, please," he drawled. "There's no point staying in the closet if you leave the door wide open. Really, those two? Worst kept Slytherin secret since Malfoy's daddy lied and bribed to the Wizengamot to get off."

"So I need to apologize? Why like this?" Daphne asked, trying to keep up with the taller boy's stride.

"Because the longer we let these feelings fester, the worse it'll be," Blaise replied. "We also need to separate ourselves from Snape."

"Oh, I'm well aware of that," Daphne replied. "Longbottom's got some big ones bragging like that."

"I'm not so sure he does," Blaise replied. "Was I the only one who saw how Potter redirected all attention to Longbottom?"

Daphne thought about it for a moment and her eyes went wide. "Oh my. You're right. He did. And deflected all the attention that was going to happen the next time we saw him."

"We're not at Hogwarts anymore. We need to remember that and not fall into the same cliques because everything has changed," Blaise said as they wandered through the halls of the Vault. "There's no house solidarity or anything like that here. There's us. The Vault."

"I suppose..."

"Just think about it while we search."


	13. Chapter 13

.

**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

By DireSquirrel

.

* * *

AN: There has been some confusion about some of what I've written and I think most of it surrounds the differences between the Fallout World and our world. Fallout is NOT our world. They didn't figure out miniaturization of computers until the 2060s, while we started doing that as soon as possible, which is why the Pipboy, a gomy GPS, inventory and medical scanner, is one of the most advanced and miniaturized computers available. CGI and similar effects that we see all the time and take for granted are almost completely unknown to the Fallout world, however, they have hologram technology and robotics much more advanced than ours.

It's important to keep these things in mind, because the Fallout world is NOT our world, nor is it the canon Harry Potter world. The USSR still exists as a Stalinish regime; China is much more like Maoist China than the one we know today. The US and UK are darker, less respectful of human rights and sometimes outright disregard them. The muggle side of the UK is much more like the magical side of the UK in that civil rights are more and more ignored.

To those who are complaining about the pace of this story: The bombs will fall soon, but not right away. To build up to the next story arch, there are a few things I need to have happen, which is why I have paced the story like I have. This is Fallout. You KNOW the bombs are going to fall, so there's no reason to make it the big focus of the story until they absolutely need to fall.

Now, on with the story.

* * *

.

Hermione Granger was exploring while feeling sorry for herself. She really regretted putting all the attention on Harry that morning. She was impulsive. She knew that. For all her reputation for lists and mapping things out in detail, when she saw something wrong, she jumped on it, often without all the facts. It had gotten her in trouble before and this time she'd done it to her friend. Again. The last time it had taken Harry a while to forgive her for taking the Firebolt. Hopefully she could take care of this more quickly.

She walked into a new room. She had yet to explore this section and from what he had said last night, it sounded like Harry had not been down this way yet either. It was filled with large box like machines. They weren't computers, but something else.

"Hey Baby," said a deep, smooth voice. Hermione let out a surprised squeak and looked around for the voice. "Over here."

She glanced in the direction of the voice and saw a strange box that looked like it was the dirty love child of a computer/refrigerator/fish tank/greenhouse/chemistry-set orgy.

"YEAH Baby! Right here!" it said.

"Are you talking to me?"

"Who else is there? Course I'm talkin' to you Hot Cakes," the machine said.

"Sorry, it's just the father of a friend of mine says to worry if you find something that can think for itself and you can't find it's brain," Hermione replied.

"Ouch, harsh, Hot Cakes," it said in a pained voice. "I'm all right here, computer system for a brain, no worries."

"Okay, what are you?" she asked, mentally reminding herself to get it checked out.

"Baby, I'm the improved, uncertified, extra rarefied, testified GS-2000 MKII Biological Research Station. I'm a life-makin' machine," it said proudly. "I'm the best, baby, better than the original. You give me your seed and I give you sweet, sweet life."

"That sounds rather dirty. I think I'm going to leave now," Hermione replied as she moved towards the door.

"Wait!" it called out, clearly panicked. "I'm talking about plants!"

"You give plant life?" Hermione paused. "Wait, cloning? You can clone a plant from a sample?"

"Oh, sure Baby. Like I said, I'm the best," it said.

"Do you destroy the sample when you analyze it?" she asked.

"No way Baby! I'm the best, that means pure genetic analysis," it replied. "I'm awesome that way, Sugar Buns."

"Why can you talk?" she inquired. "Is that standard?"

"I can do what I do because of the wonders of corporate espionage, Baby," it replied proudly. "Plans stolen right from the laboratories of the Big Empty."

"You're proud to be stolen property?" she asked.

"Yeah, Hot Cakes," it said.

"Isn't that illegal?"

"Only if it happened in the States and that alllll the way on the other side of the Pond, Sugar Buns."

"Why do you refer to me with such insulting sexist nicknames?"

"Just the way I'm programmed, luscious legs."

"Uh, okay. I'll uh, come back if I find some plant samples I want replicated."

"You do that, come back and give me your seed!" it called out as Hermione fled the botany lab.

* * *

"Wow, this is quite a library," Harry said as he explored. He was a bit surprised not to find the Grangers here with their noses in the books. It was clear that Hermione's love of the written word was definitely an inherited trait.

"Welcome to the LIBRARY!" said a voice. Harry flinched and pulled out a wand.

"Who was that?" he asked, glancing around.

"It is I, your HOLLYWOOD-VOICE NARATE-O-TRON 7000 and LIBRARIAN!" it replied in a voice Harry vaguely recalled from some movie Dudley had watched on the telly. It had explosions. That was pretty much all Harry remembered of it. "I am here for all your LIBRARY needs. I shelve, I sort, I index, I collate, I rebind! I read stories to children in a variety of voices! If you keep a book too long: FEAR MY LATE FEES!"

"Aren't librarians supposed to keep people quiet?" Harry asked, noting that the voice seemed to originate from the stacks. He started in that direction and found a large robot on its side, tipped at an angle that was clearly not its normal position. It had a barrel for a torso with triangular tracks that spun uselessly in the air. It's arms were like long Slinkys covered in metallic cloth that flailed about, apparently unable to muster the strength to push itself upright.

"I unfortunately cannot bend my torso!" the robot said waving to the teen with one arm that seemed to stretch out for greater reach. "I have fallen and I can't get up so I increased my volume to maximum in the hopes that someone would assist me in retrieving my equilibrium."

"Oh, uh sure, let me do that," Harry said, whipping out his wand and casting a quick levitation charm. The robot lifted up off the ground, spun around until it was positioned vaguely in the correct orientation. Harry lowered it close the ground and canceled the spell, letting it settle back down onto its treads.

"THANK YOU VAULT CITIZEN! HAIL BRITANNIA!" It called out, throwing its slinky-like arms up in the air in apparent joy.

"Sure," Harry said, though he was actually more unsure of it. "Has my friend come by? Bushy hair, a little shorter than me."

"No, I have not yet seen a citizen of that description!" it replied, having clearly turned it's volume down. "I shall inform you via the intercom should I do so!"

"Uh, thanks," Harry said even as he started to back out of the library stacks.

"Where are you going? Don't you want to take a book?" the robot librarian asked as it followed him. "I can recommend many of Britain's greatest works. You look like a Henry V kind of man. How about some Herman Melville? He was American, but still an excellent author and one of my favorites! Looking for non-fiction? Here's the BigBook of SCIENCE!"

Harry paused briefly to look at the metal monstrosity in horror as it pulled a tome off the shelf that made Hogwarts, A History look like Ron Weasley's idea of light reading. Once the robot broke line of sight with the teen, Harry made as quick a pace as he could without actually running.

"WHERE ARE YOU GOING? I'VE GOT ALL THREE BRONTE SISTERS!"

Harry broke into a run.

"REALLY, WHO DOESN'T LIKE WUTHERING HEIGHTS?"

Blaise Zabini and Daphne Greengrass turned the corner to see Harry running away from some kind of screaming iron golem.

"WE COULD GO BACK TO MOBY DICK! 'TO THE LAST I GRAPPLE WITH THEE; FROM HELL'S HEART I STAB AT THEE; FOR HATE'S SAKE I SPIT MY LAST BREATH AT THEE,'" the robot librarian quoted as it rolled after Harry, a book about a white whale in one claw-like hand.

Daphne looked to Blaise. "Should we interfere?"

The dark skinned boy shook his head. "If Potter's fleeing it, how long would we last?"

"Didn't you say we needed to change?"

"Sure, but I didn't mean from living to dead," Blaise said as they hid around a corner, watching Harry flee the librarian.

"What are you two doing?"

The two Slytherins screeched in surprise. They turned haltingly to see a perturbed Hermione Granger standing behind them, her hands on her hips, feet slightly wide. She gave them The Look which she had adapted to her own use from the original McGonagall model.

"We came to find you and Potter because your parents wanted to unload the tents so families could live in them," Daphne explained.

"We got here when Potter was running away from the iron golem screaming about killing him in some kind of murder/suicide," Zabini explained.

"Iron Golem?"

"A different sort from those with the one eye and the strange metal body," Daphne explained. "Big barrel shaped body, two legs that rolled along like wheels that were made of chains instead of fused and a pair of glowing lights for horns. Arms like flexible tubes that ended with three fingered claws. Some wrinkly gray thing in a glass dome."

Hermione sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, closing her eyes and counting to ten.

"Those are robots, not golems," Hermione replied in a tired voice. "The first is a Protectron, a robot designed to defend places and people. I'm not sure of the model of the second robot, but I'm sure it's not something to worry about." She looked down the hallway. "Harry went down there?"

"Yes, you should go find him and meet us at the field," Zabini replied as he and Greengrass started edging away.

"You're not coming too? I thought you needed to find us?"

"Correct, however I'm not about to challenge a muggle golem. It seemed pretty angry," Zabini said.

"It's a robot, not a golem!"

* * *

"Oh, _hel~lo_ Mr. Potter," a mechanical voice said as Harry took refuge in another room. Harry turned to see a pair of pink and blue Mr. Orderly units hovering about a white and pale blue room.

"How did you know I was-"

"All vault dweller's facial characteristics were included in our internal database, Mr. Potter," the pink one said. "What brings you to the nursery? Interested in adding to our biological database? Wink-Wink-Nudge-Nudge?"

"This is a nursery?" Harry asked. The blue Mr. Orderly pointed with one manipulator tool towards a door.

"That is the special complete nursery. State of the art! All the latest technology for caring for your children," it replied proudly. "Wink-Wink-Nudge-Nudge?"

"I don't have any children," Harry said. "Why are you saying 'Wink-Wink' and all that?"

"We don't have faces to use for body language," The pink one explained. "But getting back to you reproducing and having many children, Wink-Wink-Nudge-Nudge, Knowing-looks-and-glances, know what I mean, know what I mean?"

"Nope, quite clueless, and I'm starting to think that was a good thing," Harry replied.

"Well, then allow me to suggest a few vault dwellers that our database states should fit your biological profile," the blue one said.

"And it's it's a physical issue, allow me to assist you in our latest fertility medicines," the pink one explained.

"No, no. I'm just exploring," Harry said defensively. "Getting my bearings, so to speak."

"Understandable Mr. Potter," the blue one replied. "We were just concerned that the Vault records did not have you with your assigned bed mates last night. They were chosen under the most exacting tests to be the best possibilities for you."

"To be honest, I don't even know who I was assigned with initially," Harry said, wondering if he had made a mistake in running from the librarian.

"Well, then allow me to print out your recommended bed mates," the pink one said. "After all, it's up to you to keep us in business! Wink-Wink-Nudge-Nudge, Knowing-looks-and-glances, know what I mean, _know-what-I-__mean_?"

A nearby printer creaked and groaned as it spat out a leaf of dot matrix text. The blue Mr. Orderly ripped it off the roll and floated over to Harry. He tentatively took it, as he'd heard stories of what could happen when Mr. Handy units went off the reservation.

"Katie Bell? Padma and Parvati? I didn't even know those two were here," Harry muttered to himself as he read the list. "Penelope? She's like a sister and _way_ too old for me! I don't even know who Elaine Bitoni is. What is this? You've even giving me their three sizes, and seduction recommendations? Because that's not normal."

"We're in the business of babies! Think of it as ensuring we've always got someone to take care of!" the two said in unison. "We also have some special injections to make sure your swimmers know which way to go."

"No offense, but... I'm not ready to be a father," Harry admitted.

"I HAVE A COMPLETE SELECTION OF BOOKS ON PARENT HOOD!"

"Merlin, it found me," Harry hissed as he glanced around nervously.

"My name isn't Merlin, it's Edwardina," the blue one corrected.

"And I'm Winifred," the pink one supplied. Harry glanced about the room. Shrugging, he hit the switch that opened the door to the nursery proper and closed it behind him. He ran to the other side and hid.

Hermione, having followed the sound of book suggestions, glanced in a window and saw her best friend hiding behind a post-natal incubator, glancing at the door.

"Hello, friend NARATE-O-TRON 7000, Mr. Potter is just through that door! Make sure not to disturb the beds!"

A moment later, the door to the nursery opened up and the robot Zabini and Greengrass described rolled in. It didn't take long to divine Harry's location and started a rather one sided discussion on the benefits of reading Shakespeare at a young age. With a huff and a roll of her eyes, she marched into Delivery Room 1 to save Harry once again.

"Hello Dweller Hermione Granger!" Fred and Eddie said as she entered the room. "Goodbye Dweller Hermione Granger!" they said as she left for the nursery.

She opened the door to the nursery and huffed. The robot turned briefly to look in her direction.

"Friend Potter! I have found the young woman you were looking for!" the Narate-o-tron announce.

"Thank you, I noticed," Harry replied dryly.

"Since you're both here, I'd like to talk to you about the vault book club I'd like to set up," the robot said joyfully.

"We'd love to hear about it, but unfortunately, there's a large shipment of books that need to be shelved and logged into the database," Hermione said.

"There are? NEW BOOKS?" it exclaimed excitedly, it's grasping claws clacking together in almost orgasmic anticipation.

"Yes, in the tents at the athletic fields," she replied.

"Thank you for informing me! I shall go now to add them to the card catalog!" it replied, a dramatic hand raised to the sky. It made a U-turn so sharply, sparks struck from the treads on the metal floor. The two teens watched it leave. It paused to salute them through the window and rushed down the hall.

"Well that was an experience," Harry said, still hiding behind the incubator.

"Get out from behind there, Harry," Hermione said. He stood up with a rueful smile. "Harry, I need to apologize for this morning on the field."

"Hermione, no-"

"No, Harry, I do," she replied. "I should have known you wouldn't like the attention. I just got so annoyed and jumped the gun. I'm sorry."

"Well, the cat's out of the bag," Harry said. "At least they're not saying I'm a liar and a cheat. Now, at least. I've probably got a week before that happens, so I'll enjoy it as much as I can."

"No, but they're pretty distracted by other things," Hermione said. Harry grinned. Hermione cocked her head. "What?"

"Ask Neville about his night," Harry said. "I don't want to ruin it."

"Okay, Mr. Mysterious," she agreed hesitantly. She spotted the paper in his hand. "What's that?"

"Um... it's... well, the nursery bots wanted me to make babies and printed out suggestions," Harry said, handing it to her. "I'd like to add that I did not request it, they just went ahead and did it anyway."

"Elaine Bitoni? I don't know who that is," Hermione said as she read off the paper. "Oh wow, I didn't think they made busts that big naturally. Even Susan's not, um, that's just...wow. My back hurts just thinking about it."

"I'll take your word for it," Harry replied. "I just think it's pretty strange."

"Oh, that it is," Hermione replied. "Penny?"

"Yeah, I'm not too sure that would work out," Harry replied. "She's five years older than me, after all."

"True, but that won't matter much later on," Hermione said she paused and blushed. "Not-um-not that I'm saying you and Penny should date."

"I don't really think dating was what Fred and Eddie were interested in," Harry replied.

"Fred and Eddie?"

"Winifred and Edwardina, the Mr. Orderly units," Harry said, pointing to the delivery room with a thumb.

"Ah," she replied.

"Or should that be 'Ms. Orderly'?"

* * *

"Wow, it's like they packed up half of Hufflepuff and Gryffindor and hauled us here," Katie Bell said as she looked at people hauling the books out of the magical tents. There were loads of familiar faces from Hogwarts and a few she recognized from the Beauxbatons contingent at the Tri-Wizard.

"To a degree," Padma Patil replied. "A few of us were smuggled in. Parvati, our parents and I were not initially signed up, but Harry's letter convinced us to go along with it. What made you choose to come?"

"My folks," Katie replied. "I couldn't let them stay out and catch the rads if I could help it."

"Rads?"

"Radiation, the bad stuff from the muggle bombs after they go boom," Katie explained.

"See I understood that, not too much else," Padma admitted.

"I'm not surprised, there's a lot to science we don't get at Hogwarts," Katie replied walking beside the younger girl. Both were lugging bundles of books in the general direction of the library according to the glowing signs on the walls.

"I just wonder if we're going to have classes or if we're just going to live in here," the Ravenclaw replied. "I love learning, but I never got much education on the muggle side of things."

"Pureblood?"

"Half by my grandmother," Padma explained.

"How does that make you half?" Katie asked.

"British Pureblood rules, you're a half-blood if people can remember when you had a muggleborn ancestor," Padma explained. "Mum and Dad stay pretty close to the magical world, but Parvati spends some time in the muggle world shopping or visiting the pictures. Mum and Dad were pretty worried after the Americans annexed Canada. They signed up as soon as Harry's letter arrived."

"They here with you?" Katie asked. Padma nodded.

"One of the few families who are all here and not smuggled in," the Ravenclaw replied. "A little strange about all those kids, though."

"Yeah, I thought it would be mostly families here, but I guess not," Katie said with a shrug. "My folks are in a different vault."

"How are you dealing with that?" Padma asked.

"Not sure yet," Katie admitted as they turned a corner to the education corridor. "We've really grown apart over the years. It's been six years that I've been leaving for almost ten months at a time. We're almost strangers who live in the same house."

"That's rather depressing," Padma said. Katie just gave a noncommital noise as they entered the library.

"BOOKS! New books!" screamed an excited voice from behind them. The two girls turned in horror to look at the metallic monstrosity in the doorway. It's fingers clacked open and closed in anticipation.

Padma, having never seen a robot before, screamed at the top of her lungs, dropped the books and ran.

"If any of these are damaged I'm sending you the bill, Miss Padma Patil!" the robot called out, scooping up the books like they were priceless artifacts. "Miss Katie Bell, please place those right on the counter. Books_books_books_books_books."

"Sure..." Katie said hesitantly before going off to find her walking companion. She found her cowering in the far corner with her wand out. "Padma?"

"What _was_ that thing?"

"That would be our librarian," Katie replied. "...I think. But it's busy with the books. I think you're perfectly safe."

"You're sure?" she asked, glancing nervously from side to side.

"MORE BOOKS? I _love_ my existence!" it screamed as it received another delivery. Padma shivered and tried to hide a bit more.

"Come on," Katie said, pulling the girl to her feet.

"Are... are those things common?" Padma asked.

"That's the first of it's model I've ever seen, but if you mean robots, sure, they're fairly common," Katie said. "You didn't worry about the Mr. Handy units at breakfast. And didn't you see them at Vault-Tech?"

"Oh, I did, but everybody was acting like they were normal," she replied.

"They're not that much different from a house elf, if you think about it, except muggle, bigger and made of metal," Katie argued. "Really, nothing to worry about. The chances of them going bad are really rare."

"They can go bad?" the Indian girl asked, her eyes wide in horror.

"Very rare, almost unheard of," Katie assured the girl. She almost had to drag the Ravenclaw into the light.

"AH! Hello, Dwellers Bell and Patil!" it said. "I apologize, I just get so excited when I find books! Ooooooooooh new books!"

"See," Katie said to her companion. "It just likes books. Well, _really_ likes books if that sound was anything to judge, but nothing to worry about."

"Okay," Padma said, her fingers practically glued to her wand as she mechanically marched out of the room.

* * *

Everywhere people were going about the tasks they'd arranged. The children ran all over the place and routinely came back to the older dwellers to report their finds. It had taken a bit, but Harry and Hermione had finally made it back to the athletic fields to set up the rest of the tents.

"Sure, I don't mind letting people stay in my tents," Harry replied to Elijah's question. "We only bought them because we needed the space and they were a good balance between size and cost. They also collapsed so we could store them for later."

"Thank you, we hope to use them as flats for married couples and families," the older wizard replied.

"All I ask is that if someone finds something that we forgot was in there that they return it," Harry said. He shrugged. "We're donating most of it to communal use anyway. Especially the books and a few other resources."

"Thank you," the older man replied. "That means a lot."

"Don't be afraid of asking the robots for help," Harry said. He thought over his earlier encounter and nodded. "Some are a bit pushy, but they're programmed to help with certain tasks."

"Uh, yes... we uh, had a visit from one," Elijah replied. "It... it just spent the time cutting the grass, and, uh, complaining about us being in its way."

"There are some for all kinds of tasks," Harry said. "They're all over the vault."

Together they managed to set up the other tents. 52 in total, they ranged from one room "studio" style where everything save for the loo was in one room to the suits which had separate rooms for everything like a complete flat. Harry opened one and was greeted by an angry Goddess of Owls.

"Hedwig, sorry it took so long," he said. She landed on his shoulder and nibbled on his ear. "I know, but look at this place. It's not too high, but you can go where you want inside the vault."

She expressed her disbelief with a sharp bark before she took off to explore. Harry went in to open up the other cages. One of the great things about magical tents is that even if they are folded up and shaken, the contents weren't disturbed. One by one he opened the cages, handing the inmate an owl treat before letting it fly out the door. Eventually they were all released. He flicked his wand and summoned the cages to him. He caught them with another spell and meandered his way out the door.

The cats were much the same. They were released and quickly went to explore their surroundings.

"Just curious," Menelaus asked as Harry allowed Lord Crookshanks the Indignant from his prison. The halfbreed immediately went off to find his bushy haired servant so she could properly worship him. "But how are we going to feed them all?"

"We've got some food for them," Harry said. "Hedwig eats mostly what I do when I'm at Hogwarts."

"I suspect she eats quite a bit more that you don't know about," Menelaus commented, "But we'll need to see if she's getting the right kind of diet."

"I wish we'd had this conversation before we came inside," Harry grumbled.

"I'm sure we can find the right foods," the older man told him. "As for Crookshanks and his ilk, not to mention the owls, I don't think we'll be having any trouble feeding them."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"We've got mice," Menelaus replied. "Helen saw one running across the hall last night before we went to bed. So, the cats are probably a very good idea on your part."

Harry let out a sigh of relief. He turned to look at the field. Until all of their possessions were dragged out all at the same time, it was hard to believe how much they'd carried. Everything except for the hovercars (which had been sold to pay for more stuff) from the Grangers' house, both sets of Hermione's grandparents, everything of Penelope's and everything they bought. Four plus houses worth assorted goods. Even for as large as the field was, the smuggled goods took up a huge amount of space.

The familiar items made a lot of the dwellers feel more at ease with their choice. While the vault was technically capable of providing everything they needed, it was also quite alien to them, magical and muggle raised alike. Seeing a wooden table that wasn't the same as every other vault table made them happy.

Sally looked like she was going to blow a gasket when she saw the whole array. There was a certain amount of satisfaction that she was so blown away. She protested, but was essentially ineffectual. She went off to whine to Maxie and left them alone.

* * *

"Neville," Hermione called out. The Longbottom boy looked up from the garden store supplies they'd acquired.

"Hey, Hermione," he said with a smile. "This is a lot of stuff, I'm going to enjoy going through it. I want to transfigure some pots along the walls around here so we can plant a few of these. I wonder if they'll let me use some of this field to plant in."

"I imagine they would if you explained your plan," she replied. "I heard you brought your own plants too."

"Yeah, I wasn't about to let them die," he said. "I'm not good at many things, but I know herbology. It's the only thing I'm okay with."

"Neville, don't talk like that," Hermione said chiding him. "You are good with a number of things. And you're great at herbology. You know all the plants before we start, have planted a number of them before hand and your plants always live."

"Your plants don't die either," Neville reminded her. Hermione just shook her head and changed the subject.

"I wanted to show you something I found," she said. "It's a machine that can replicate a plant from a sample."

"Really?" Neville said with a bit of amazement. "I mean, we can transfigure, but it doesn't really make the same kind of plant."

"I thought you might like to know how to use it since it fits in with what you've been learning," she said.

"Oh, I'm interested," he assured her. "I just didn't know it was possible."

"I'll just show you where it is," she said.

Neville thought it was amazing. He settled into a deep discussion with the thing as Hermione made a strategic retreat. "Three days? You can make a whole plant in only three days?"

"Sure man, it's no problemo, my manly man," the machine replied.

"I want to know exactly how this works," Neville said. He was there for hours talking about it with an assignment to head to the library for information on cloning and bioscience. It would be the friendship of a lifetime.


	14. Chapter 14

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**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

By DireSquirrel

Chapter 14

.

.

* * *

No one really knew who had made it, not even in the records that led to Hogwarts, A History. The book recorded "everyone" who was magical in time for the cut off: pureblood, halfblood or muggleborn. The book recorded the addresses of the next generation of witches and wizards. The Headmaster or Headmistress, or their deputy, was responsible for those letters to be sent to the appropriate locations and by appropriate methods.

Minerva McGonagall was the deputy headmistress of Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She had been a professor for decades and it was her pleasure and duty to introduce muggleborn children to Hogwarts.

Except this year.

Time after time, the letters went out and were returned undelivered. Unlike when Vernon and Petunia Dursley refused to allow Harry to open and respond, and the staff had charmed their house to fill with the invitations, these were returned because there was something preventing them from being delivered at all.

She knew they were alive, or else the book of students would not have produced the letters in the first place. And it wasn't just muggleborns, though all muggleborns were included.

"Albus," she said, walking into the Headmaster's office, "I have something I think you should see."

"Oh, yes, what is it?" he asked. He glanced up to see her holding a stack of folded parchment. He frowned. "Rejections?"

"No, undelivered letters," she replied, handing him one. "Look at the address."

The old man slipped on his reading glasses and inspected the letter. Though the first two lines differed depending on individual, the letters were all addressed the same way.

Name

Room

Vault-Tech United Kingdom Vault UK-13

Dover, Kent

"And these are all newly eleven, I take it?" Albus asked. "All chosen for next year, but were born after the cut off for this year?"

"Yes, mostly muggleborn, but a number are of magical families," Minerva explained. "Also Hogwarts letters for returning students."

To her surprise, her superior chuckled.

"It seems that Miss Granger and Mr. Potter went above and beyond themselves," he replied. He smiled at his deputy. "Minerva, UK-13 is the vault chosen for your favorite students and it seems that they are not alone. I knew they were bringing a few people, but not quite this many."

"Does Nymphadora have anything to say about this?" Minerva asked.

"If you read the names, you'll find she took part in the smuggling," Dumbledore replied as he flipped through the letters before handing the stack back to the younger woman. "Quite a few children of prominent Ministry officials. As disappointing it would be to not see these children this year and the next, I am pleased to know they are safe and that at least some in the Ministry took the warnings to heart."

"I knew Neville Longbottom would be joining his friends, but some of these names are quite a surprise," Minerva replied. "Tracy Davis, both Greengrass girls. Susan Bones, Hannah Abbot from Hufflepuff. Both Patil twins, Luna Lovegood. We're missing almost all our muggleborns of all years, plus the children of many Ministry employees. This won't go unnoticed."

"No, I don't suppose it will," Dumbledore said. "We shall deal with that when the time comes, Minerva. Just know now that they are safe from both Voldemort's forces and the bombs."

"Are you really sure this vault is safe?" Minerva asked.

"I have been assured by young William that it is as safe as he could make it for those inside and rather troublesome for those wishing harm," Albus explained. "We will have to trust the muggles to defend against their own dangers."

"Yes," she said tiredly. "I will miss them so. My next question is about hiring. Are you done?"

Albus looked like his Lemon Sherbert Drop had gone distinctly sour.

"Unfortunately Minister Fudge has taken the matter out of my hands," Dumbledore replied. "Delores Umbridge will be this year's Defense professor. Luckily, our old colleague Professor Slughorn will be returning as I impressed upon him the danger of remaining in the muggle world."

"Slughorn? What about Snape?" Minerva asked.

"While I do appreciate what Nymphadora has sacrificed for others, I felt it was necessary to have another nearby should Mr. Potter require assistance," Dumbledore explained.

"You sent him into the vault? What ever for? You _know_ how he treats Mr. Potter!" Minerva protested.

"Severus has needed to keep up appearances, when Voldemort discovered Severus had received a vault ticket due to his muggle summer residence, he commanded that Severus use it," the old man explained. Minerva was clearly not satisfied by the answer. "While we lose a spy, I know there is another person near to Harry who I know I can trust."

"You had better hope you are right, Albus," she warned. "Because if he has pulled the wool over your eyes, you had better pray the rest of those vault dwellers are not simple sitting ducks."

"There are reasons Severus has my trust, reasons that are not truly important at the moment," Albus assured her. "But they are good reasons."

She looked at him, lips thinned as if she were about to protest, but she shook her head and gave him a rueful smile. "I hope you are right. I really do."

* * *

The first day of school at Hogwarts was particularly tense. It was impossible not to notice how empty the Hogwarts Express was. Malfoy, with his shiny prefect badge, strutted up and down the cars, looking for his prey. He knew from his father that the mudblood and Potty hadn't been chosen as prefects, McGonagall going for Brown and the Weasel. Draco Malfoy went from cabin to cabin, taking points for reasons only Severus Snape could appreciate.

"You there, fat badger- 50 points from Hufflepuff for being so fat," he said, Pansy cackling at his side. The young girl, a very young twelve year old who had just barely been born for the previous year's cut off, was not obese, far from it. She had a slightly stocky build that was perfectly natural for some girls in the early part of puberty.

"Get out of here, Malfoy," commanded an older Hufflepuff.

"Tut-tut," Malfoy said, holding out his badge. "Threatening a prefect. 100 points from Hufflepuff."

"And I'll take another twenty for you both being Hufflepuffs!" Pansey cackled.

"And I'll take two hundred each from Slytherin for Crabbe and Goyle being Draco Malfoy's robe sucking minions," said a voice behind them. Ron Weasley, flanked by his brothers and sister, glared down at the blonde menace.

"Weasels," Malfoy sneered in his best Snape impression. "Where's potty and the Mudblood? Haven't been able to find them. Potty upset that he's not getting the attention he wanted?"

"Wait! I heard something about this," Parkinson cut in. "Aren't they living in some dirty hole in the ground?"

"I did hear something about that," Malfoy replied.

"And I heard your daddy likes to suck snakes, that true?" Ginny asked.

Draco snarled and went for his wand, only to find every Weasley wand pointed right back at him. Crabbe and Goyle had his back as usual and Pansy was quick to suck up and followed suit.

"Fifty points from Gryffindor for lack of respect for a prefect," Pansy said. "Each."

Fred glanced at the Hufflepuffs on the other side of the doorway. The older one, one of the Badger Beaters, stood back out and pulled out his wand.

"Merlin, you weasels almost as bad as badgers," Malfoy taunted a moment before he caught a silent stunner in the back. Spells started flying. Ron went down to a jelly legs hex from Crabbe, but the Slytherins were quick to fall.

"Thanks, Mate," Ron said to the Hufflepuff beater.

"No problem, but aren't you going to get in trouble?" the sixth year asked.

"He's not pushing me around this year," Ron Weasley replied.

"Fred-"

"Yes, George?"

"I think Malfoy wants to be the first human test subject for some of our products," George said.

"Is that what being sprawled out on the floor drooling means?" Ginny asked.

"Looks like it to me," the Hufflepuff second year said.

"See, inter-house agreement," Fred pointed out. "It MUST be true then."

"Sounds pretty clear cut to me," Ron said. "Um... fifty points to Hufflepuff each for being loyal to each other. And um... fifty points to all of us for being brave. Except for the Slytherins."

"Thanks!" the second year girl said.

* * *

Draco Malfoy woke up, not sure of where he'd been, feeling like he had the Bubonic plague, the Andromeda Strain, the Phage and Dragon Pox all at the same time. His expensive tailored robes had been replaced by gardener robes that stunk of dung and some kind of fecal matter had been rubbed quite thoroughly into his hair. He glanced around the car and spotted Crabbe, Goyle and Pansy struggling to get out of a swamp. She narrowly dodged an angry crocodile that appeared out of the water, sending the three of them struggling to fight their way through the muck and sludge of the portable swamp.

"Use your wands!" Draco commanded. However, he had somehow acquired an incomprehensible accent so it came out as: "yus er vonze."

"Hem-hem," said a voice. Draco turned to gape in horror as Delores Umbridge dressed as a dominatrix. "That's four pants from Slytherin for this unseemly display."

"You can't do that!" he tried to say as he clung to his trousers before they could be pulled away, only to spout "ewe campt goo dha!"

"Oh, dahling, yes she can," drawled a Severus Snape dressed in Delores Umbridge's usual pink robes.

Draco screamed in horror.

"Now, don't be that way," Umbridge said, flicking a whip that extended from the end of her wand. The youngest Malfoy thought back to the last thing he remembered and realized it had to be Potter's fault, because Draco had been looking for him. Once again, a failure of logic did nothing to impede his decision making.

* * *

Fred and George looked down at the four Slytherins who were all screaming about something or other. Their enlarged tongues made it impossible for the test subjects to be understood.

"Extra Strength Lemon Sherbert Drops inducing fear, check," said Fred as she checked off a box on his clipboard.

"How do they respond to outside stimulus?" asked George before flicking off a derivative to Ginny's bat bogy hex, which instead made insects and centipedes crawl out of a person's nose and along their body.

"No! No!" Draco said called out, "it can't be true! When my father hears of this he'll be very mad at you ants!"

"Check!" said Fred. "Now pain response during the effect."

George went around and kicked all three boys in their reproductive organs. Ginny jumped in to help with Pansy with a swift kick to the buttocks. All screamed like they'd just been kicked in sensitive places.

"Yes, but I think we should try this test at least three more times," Ginny suggested.

"Our dear sister is quite correct, my dear brother," said Fred. "The scientific process requires reproducible results."

"And I concur," said George.

"On three, one two-

"ARGH!" Malfoy screamed. Fred and George gave their sister a half-hearted glare.

"_On_ three, not _before_ three, Ginny," they said in unison.

"Sorry, but I'd better kick the rest of them so the other tests are on the same baseline," she replied.

"Very well," the twins agreed, allowing their sister to kick the other three.

"One, two, three."

"ARGH!" all four Slytherins said together.

* * *

Pansy was in a world of colors. Pastel greens, blues pinks and purples with a little yellow here and there. There was singing flowers and smiling clouds. Rainbows fell out of clear skies. The air smelled of sweet spring apple blossoms wafting on the wind with pink trees flowing back and forth.

And a little purple pony with a rainbow mane was kicking her repeatedly in the gut.

"Don't kick me pretty princess purple pony!" Pansy called out, trying to hug the hallucination. "I just want to be your special friend!"

* * *

"Hello Gregory," said a white rabbit clad in robes of black leather, with a pair of small sunglasses perched on its nose. It's voice was a deep baritone that was incongruous with it's small stature and form.

"Hello," Greg Goyle replied.

"We're late, Greg, we're late for a very important date," the rabbit said. It was suddenly dressed in expensive red robes with a great big pocket watch hanging from a chain around its neck. The creature reached into a pocket and pulled out a pair of glasses like Potter wore, but with darkly tinted lenses, and handed them over to the boy

"Oh, that's not good," Greg replied as he slipped the glasses on. "We should get going. Uh, where are we going?"

"Down the rabbit hole of course," it said, holding out a paw. "Take the red potion or the blue potion."

"What happens if I take both?"

"Dude, best trip ever," a caterpillar answered for the rabbit.

"Okay," Greg replied, popping both potions into his mouth growing both larger and smaller at the same time. "But can you stop kicking me in the crotch, it kinda hurts."

"Hey, it's all about love, man," the rabbit said. "You gotta have love."

"All about the love," Greg mused. "That makes so much sense."

"Well, peace, love and music," the caterpillar countered. "And getting high."

"Touche," the rabbit said, giving his hooka smoking friend a bow.

* * *

Vincent Crabbe sat in a chair that kept kicking him in the groin.

Colors were everywhere and he was everywhere and he was the colors and he had a noodle which was his brain, but was actually a five but not always because it tasted like music which smelled like a guitar going "wah-wah-wah" but was actually an enchilada that liked to dance and eat the smell of Harry Potter's eyes.

He was a part of everything and nothing. He understood completely what it was like to be dead and understood completely what it meant to be alive. He reached out and had about twelve arms and pulled in the world which he kept within himself.

Everything made sense. Even how up was orange and left was half four.

* * *

"And that concludes our test for today," George said.

"Does that have anything to do with the fact we just pulled into the station?" Ginny asked.

"Just a coincidence," the twins replied.

"And now, the obliviation," Ginny said, flicking her wand at Malfoy's head.

"Yes, the most important part of human trials," Fred agreed.

* * *

"Miss Parkinson! Mr. Malfoy! It's quite impossible for Harry Potter to have done this to you," Minerva McGonagall said after she found them. She'd noticed Slytherin was missing two prefects when they failed to show up to escort their new first years. She found them sleeping in the manure of the Thestral paddock. Miss Parkinson had been clinging to a particularly nervous Thestral that simply kept very, very still even as the girl squeezed her a bit too much. After waking them up, they instantly blamed it all on Harry Potter. "You two should be ashamed of yourselves! Honestly, if you want to roll around in the dung there are other places and better times!"

"We didn't want to!" Malfoy snarled back.

"Ten points from Slytherin for taking that tone of voice with me, young man," McGonagall hissed. "And detention. If you like dung so much, you can assist Filch with cleaning the toilets. With a toothbrush."

"You can't do that!" he protested, "When my father hears of-"

"With _your_ toothbrush, then!" With a glare, the Deputy Headmistress bent down and ripped the prefect badge from his chest. She flicked her wand and did the same to Pansy, who protested.

"You have both proven you cannot be trusted with the care of others in your house, on the first night no less!" McGonagall replied. "You'll both be having a long discussion with your Head of House before you go to bed."

Malfoy smirked. 'Professor Snape won't do anything to us,' he thought.

A short while later Draco would be quite disappointed.

* * *

At that same time, deep within the Forbidden Forest:

"And that's why everything is green," Vincent Crabbe replied to his new found Centaur friend.

"Huh," said Bane. "and here I thought it was because of the chlorophyll, I would have never guessed it was because the moon smells purple or that the sun was really the tip of a really long quill."

"I know," Vincent said, waving his hands to encompass everything. "It was like in that moment, I knew _everything_."

"Ah, I understand that feeling," Bane agreed. He passed a pipe to his new friend. "Have a puff and everything will make sense again."

"Thanks," Crabbe said. After a deep drag he let the smoke trickle out of his lips ever so slowly. He looked at a twig. "Wow."

"I know."

"Wow."

"That. That's a twig."

"Wow."

"I _know_, isn't it?"

"Wow."

* * *

"Dumbledore," Delores Umbridge said in as close as a sweet voice as she could manage. "Where is Harry Potter?"

Dumbledore glanced up at her.

"Huh? What?" the old headmaster asked.

"Where is Harry Potter?" she repeated.

"Why are you asking?" Dumbledore countered.

"Because he's not here and he never showed up for his trial," Umbridge replied. "I know you've got him hidden away somewhere."

"Oh, no, I haven't hidden him anywhere," Dumbledore replied honestly.

"Then where is he?" she demanded. "The Minister is very concerned of his use of magic this summer."

"Hmm... Sorry, can't help you, Lemon Sherbert Drop?" he asked holding out a tray. He raised his eyebrows. "They're fast dissolving."

"He has broken the law and trying to protect him from the consequences of his actions will-"

"Are you sure you don't want a Lemon Sherbert Drop?" he asked. "They're extra strength."

"No, I want to know where you are hiding a fugitive from law," she demanded.

"A fugitive? Do you really think I would hide a fugitive? The Lemon Sherbert Drops are really good, I'm sure you'll enjoy it," Dumbledore replied, pulling his best "I'm Awesome because I'm Dumbledore" routine. It was very similar to a certain starship captain's "I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you over how Awesome I am" routine, but worked better for old wizards dressed in robes of colors not found in nature.

"WHERE IS HARRY POTTER?" she screamed, her face red, as she slammed her palms on the table.

"If you can't be civil, I'm going to have to ask you to leave," Dumbledore replied. "Honestly, not taking a Lemon Sherbert Drop when offered."

"Forget about the bloody candy!" the woman snarled. Dumbledore immediately popped a Lemon Sherbert Drop into her open mouth. Umbridge gagged slightly as it caught in her throat, but ended up letting it dissolve

"See, that wasn't so hard, now was it?" he said, giving her a scolding look. "Now, what was it you wanted to ask me?"

"Why is Harry Potter not here?"

"Oh, he's decided to leave the magical world," Dumbledore replied. "He tried to warn people and they didn't listen, so he decided to leave people to their fate. I think. Or he could have gone off to find Dumbo the flying elephant. Or was that my brother? You know, I'm not really sure. No, now that I think about it, my brother was definitely the one looking for Dumbo the flying elephant. He had such large ears you see, and he learned to flap them so he could fly like a bird." Dumbledore flapped his hands to mimic the animal. He squinted at the near apoplectic woman. "You _do_ know what an elephant is, don't you?"

He paused.

"Madame Umbridge are you okay?" Umbridge smelled Dumbledore feel.

"Your face!" she screamed pointing at him. "Your face is melting!"

Dumbledore frowned. "That's not a nice thing to say," he replied. "Just because I'm getting on in years doesn't mean-"

"No! I know _all_ the years," she replied as Dumbledore began to flash between colors like an Andy Warhol painting. Then she tasted music. Then she fell over.

Dumbledore stood up and glanced down at the woman shivering and drooling over the floor.

"I'll have to thank the Weasley Twins for the chance to test their new product after I escort Madame Umbridge to the Hospital Wing," he said before glancing up at his familiar. "Fawkes, do you know if my brother actually ever did find a flying elephant?"

The bird quickly shook his head.

"A shame, and here I thought that was what drove him to drink all those years ago," Dumbledore replied as he levitated Umbridge up from the floor, magically dragging her behind him.

* * *

"How is she, Poppy?" Albus Dumbledore inquired. "Any chance she might need quarantine?"

"Unfortunately no," the school nurse replied. "She's already worn off whatever the twins laced those candies with."

"She said my face was melting," Dumbledore mused. "Are you sure she's not a medical danger to the students?"

"I wish I could lie about this and say yes, but unfortunately at the time my oaths require me to say, no, she is not, at least not at this time," Poppy replied. The look of disappointment on the old man's face was almost comical.

"Unofficially, do you think she's capable of becoming a danger to the plans we've made?" Albus asked in a low voice.

"I read the books and journals Kingsley acquired for me, I had to order a new medical dictionary to understand much of it, but as far as I know, Hogwarts should be as safe as any muggle vault," she replied. "Aside from the first couple of days, have there been any problems?"

"Not that I am aware of, no," he said. "Nymphadora did say that her mother was learning all she could about muggle healing techniques to find a blend between the two."

"I wish her luck, some of the things I've heard muggles do..." she trailed of, her jaw set in a concerned expression.

"Actually, I've heard that some of the muggle concoctions have been better than some of her potions," Albus replied. "Something called a stimpak. It's positively amazing what these muggles have come up with. Has Pomona told you about Mr. Longbottom's description of one machine? It can create an entire plant from a single sample, even a dead sample. Incredible!"

"It is amazing, but something so many would never believe," Poppy responded, glancing pointedly to Umbridge's hospital bed.

"Yes, unfortunately," the headmaster reluctantly agreed. He glanced toward the potion cabinet. "Are there any other ingredients you feel we might be missing? Some that we do not yet have in stock?"

"A few," Poppy agreed. "But with a few special purchases, we should have little difficulty getting the stock. I've already given the list to Minerva."

"Good, good," he said. "And you have no objection to what we're planning?"

"Albus," she said flatly. "My oaths are to do my best to keep people safe. Healers are specifically instructed that we cannot save everyone, but we must do our best to save those already in our care. This is much preferable to other solutions that were considered."

"Thank you," he said. "Though I do believe that you should, perhaps, choose a few apprentices this year. I'm sure there are some students interested in the Healing arts."

"I've been considering that myself these past few years, especially with Mr. Potter's injuries," the school nurse replied. "It might be a good idea to arrange for a healing elective course."

"Ah, yes, a wonderful idea! Perhaps one for those who have completed their OWLs and beyond," Albus replied. He glanced up as Umbridge made the first sounds of waking up. "Should she ask about Mr. Potter, direct all questions to me."

"I don't want her in here on a regular basis," Poppy warned. "This wing is supposed to be a place of healing, not extra stress."

"Yes, indeed," Albus said with a twinkling eye.

* * *

**Next Time:** Hello... hello... hello... hello... Hey! It echoes!


	15. Chapter 15

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**I Fall(out) to Pieces**

Chapter 15

By DireSquirrel

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* * *

_AN: I decided to combine the rest of this arc into one chapter since it all deals with the same ideas, but don't expect this kind of length on a regular basis. The bombs fall next chapter. Please stop asking me when they're going to fall._

* * *

Almost everything from Harry, Hermione and Penelope's stash was taken care of by the other 400+ vault dwellers. Everyone had done their part, even the children who had been gleeful at the very intelligent animals Harry had released and all the places they could go. Thankfully there had been no accidents, but most people knew it was just the first day.

Taking a break for tea, the Davises, Tonkses, Penelope Clearwater, Velma Greengrass and a few of the other adults had gathered around one of the tables in the cafeteria to discuss the day.

"Okay, so we have the sleeping situation set, the animals are released and are helping with the rodent problem, we've successfully declawed Sally and 'Maxie,'" Andromeda listed as she talked with her fellow Hogwarts graduates. She sighed and leaned back in her seat. "And so now we have to deal with Snape. For real, I mean."

"He's already set up his potions lab in my locket flat," Nymphadora explained with a grumble. "I'm not pleased, but at least it gives us a place to keep him."

"Did you give him back his wand?" Penelope asked. The auror shook her head.

"Not yet, but I can't keep it forever," she replied. "As much as we dislike him, we can't keep him locked up in isolation."

"He did come into my shop for a replacement," Ollivander said. "I told him that he still had a very good connection with his original wand so there was little need of a replacement. He was not pleased, but understood. He seemed...resigned to his fate almost."

"He's not safe," the Tonks matriarch countered. "He's a danger to anyone who he feels slighted him. I know what he's capable of. We can't trust him not to take it out on the next person who accidentally cuts him off in the hallway."

"What about an oath?" Mary asked as she pulled her baby to her chest. The muggleborn mother-to-be from France shrugged.

"Oaths must be very precise," she said, shuffling in her seat. "All kinds of contracts have escape clauses. We need it to state exactly what we want or else it might do more harm than good."

"An unbreakable oath," Ted said. "Nothing else would suffice."

"I think I speak for all of us when I say we don't want him around children, but there's no reason he can't be an actual potions master, just not a potions instructor," Elijah Davis said. "We need to make sure that the oath ensures that he doesn't try to take over or kill us all with a potion in the water supply or other method."

"We'll work it out," Ted said. "Just keep him under house arrest for the time being until we can figure out exactly how we want the oath to read."

"I can lock him up each night," Nymphadora replied. "But during the day he needs to be out and about."

"Let's table this for now and enjoy the tea," Elijah replied. "It's actually quite good."

The others nodded. They relaxed and enjoyed the tea.

* * *

By the end of the day, everyone was exhausted. The tents were set up, a number of them still used as storage for the items the Grangers and extended family didn't need right off the bat. The magical cats (no-one but the purebloods called them Kneazles and it wasn't catching on) and owls made a good dent in the rodent population so far as the Dwellers could tell, but thirty animals would not be enough to cover the whole vault.

The dwellers found their beds and plunked themselves down, now one to a bed (save for the children who were being clingy). A number of the older teens and adults, especially those with young children themselves, had moved in with the children so they could have a pseudo parent, which was needed much more than any of the non-parents expected. They had decided on one adult or teen to a room to act as a parental unit. It made much more sense than the grouping Sally and Maxie had mapped out.

"Harry!"

The teen in question woke up to four little hands shaking him. The room was dark. He'd been assigned 5 little ones, the oldest only six years old, the youngest only four. Any child younger than four was living with some with actual parenting experience, which Harry very much did not have.

"What?" he asked, slipping on his glasses. He squinted at the dark shapes in the room as he struggled to find the light switch. Flipping it on he found himself face to face with two blubbering children. "What's the matter?"

The children, brother and sister said something about missing their parents between their sobs. Harry didn't get all of it. "I don't really understand," he said, prompting the two children to burst into sobs again. He sat up and tried to think of what to do. After thinking of some possibilities he went with "Do the opposite of the Dursleys" method. Confused and worried, he motioned for the children to climb up with him. They clamored up on either side of him and clung to him like a life-raft.

"Couldn't sleep?" he asked.

"I want Mummy," one of them blubbered. Hesitantly, Harry reached out and put his arm around her. He didn't know what to do other than not hurt her. She was a year older than her brother who even at four had a baby-accent that Harry found difficult to decipher. The girl clung to his side and sobbed into his pajamas. Her little brother climbed up on his other side and did the same.

"Uh... I'm here and you're okay," Harry said with really no clue if he was actually helping. The sobbing didn't stop, so he patted them on the back. They just grabbed a hold tighter.

Harry didn't get much sleep that night.

* * *

Neville woke up to find a child climbing into bed with him. He froze as surely as he had when Hermione hexed him at the end of their first year. Unsure of what to do he kept still. The child clung to him and eventually went back to sleep.

Neville didn't.

After two nights of almost no sleep, he was pretty much useless the next day.

There were a lot of baggy eyes the next morning when Sally set off the klaxons again.

The vault dwellers stood up, most of the teens having been woken multiple times by crying children, requests for assistance to the loo and other problems, and all the magicals pulled out their wands.

Like a mob of zombies, they swerved and swayed towards the Overseer's office, eyes bloodshot and heads throbbing with a klaxon initiated headache.

It would take Healer Andromeda Tonks seven hours to completely remove all the hexes from Sally. On the other hand, the Overseer's assistant did get to experience what it was like to be a purple and yellow polka-dotted donkey for that time.

* * *

Once Sally was back up in action, the eldest of the vault dwellers gathered in one of the conference room. Andromeda plopped Sally into a chair next to her "Maxie" and slumped into her own.

"Okay," Elijah Davis said. "We can't keep this up."

"I'm just following my directions, unlike some people I can name," Sally replied sullenly, slumping in her chair.

"We can't keep butting heads," Elijah said, heading beyond the blonde's interruption. "You're still being stubborn even when you were almost hexed into oblivion. One would think you'd have learned your lesson yesterday, but apparently not."

"The problem is that you think you still have power," Andromeda put in, glaring at both Vault-Tech employees. "You don't. If it wasn't for your knowledge of the vault being valuable and people currently unwilling to kill, you would be dead. The way you're going some people might be willing to lose those compunctions."

"We need to come to a compromise," Ted put in. "We can't keep doing this."

"We're not going to be ruled by two people, you should have already seen that," Mary put in as she nursed her infant. It had taken hours to get the child calmed down. She was worried about hearing damage since they had been sleeping directly under a speaker when it had gone off.

"I propose a council," the French mother-to-be suggested. "No single person with all the power. We all have something to contribute. Why not all agree to do so?"

"I think that's a great idea," the Overseer said. Sally's head spun so fast you'd swear she got whiplash. Words failed her, but disbelief was written clearly across her face. He shrugged at her. "Too much has changed. If they didn't have wands, then it might have been a different story, but everyone here has a weapon and they aren't afraid to use them. You found that out Sally. You push too hard some times."

"I-"

"Sally, no," the Overseer said, cutting the woman off. "So this council, how is that going to work?"

"I thought maybe a combination of appointments and random selections," the pregnant woman replied. "We nominate people for their skills, but the other seats are randomly chosen."

"It could work," the Overseer said.

"And it's mandatory," Ted said. They looked at him with confusion. "Make it so that everyone has to serve. No consecutive terms. Greek democracy."

"We're small enough that it will work," Menelaus put in. "Restrict it to people twenty and up, though."

"Why?"

"Because having children involved might easily cause problems when they need to be at school," he replied flatly.

"Then why not have it at seventeen?" the Zabini matriarch asked.

"That might be magical adulthood, but everything is different here," Hermione's step-grandfather put in. He'd adapted quite well to the concept of magic, especially when Andromeda had cured his arthritis with a flick of her wand. "These kids need to learn more than just magic, they should learn science and literature, ethics and mathematics. It doesn't make sense to learn one and toss the other aside like trash."

"I don't understand," Elijah said. "We don't abandon-"

"Actually that's exactly what you do," Helen's mother argued. "My Hermione wanted to go to the moon when she was a child. Now she's a witch. Just talking with her, she's horribly behind in many fields she used to love. There's no reason her children and grandchildren should have to choose between the two. Add those extra years to give them a better education across the board."

"In the last two days we've seen wonders," Ted said, finding himself agreeing with the muggles. "Both sides of us. The Longbottom boy spent four hours yesterday talking with a plant making machine. Four hours! It could do things without magic that we wizards and witches would have to spend months to do right using specialized charms and transfigurations. It analyzed the wood in the boy's wand and told him he'd have a seedling in a couple of days! We've got a robot for a librarian! On the other side, Andy cured a number of things with a flick of her wand that would have been nearly impossible otherwise, not to mention they wouldn't have happened in the first place if not for magic. We've got plenty of room because of Miss Granger and Mr. Potter."

"I suppose I can understand that," Elijah admitted. "It's just..."

"I'm not saying that this is going to be easy," Menelaus argued. "But sometimes change is needed. There's no reason we can't unite science and magic into something more here. And we should use it. There are some things magic does well, and there are some things that science and engineering do well. Take the best of them both and make something better."

"So, three more years of childhood to get a well rounded education," the mother-to-be said, rubbing her belly lightly. "That makes sense to me. We all have things to pass on. We might not be masters of our fields, but that doesn't mean we don't know what we're talking about. I've often wondered why arithmancy didn't use a calculator. Think of what could be done with a computer?"

"This idea follows my original mandate as well," the Overseer said. Heads turned to look at him. He sighed and turned to look at Sally sadly who had crossed her arms and stared off into the corner of the room in a pout. "Sally, it's too late to play games." He turned back to the vault dwellers. "My mandate is to ensure this vault works to the best way possible. I was told that everyone here had potential for psychic abilities, but apparently you got magic not psychics. Yes, as I told Mr. Potter this is a breeding experiment. Eugenics if you will, but based on genetic traits rather than physical appearance."

"They thought we were psychic?" Mary said with a bemused look.

"It is how they described special abilities beyond that of normal ken," the Overseer agreed. "Let's make a detente first of all," he glanced about the table. "No more klaxon, no more magicking my assistant."

They glanced at each other and nodded. "We can agree to that at least," Andromeda said.

"Then let's start planning this council and see how it is going to work," the Overseer replied.

* * *

After several days of long hours, the Council was planned out. 15 people with 5 seats reserved for specialists in certain fields. The other ten would be chosen at random by the central computer. They would serve for one year after which new people would be chosen. No one would be younger than twenty. No one could serve consecutive terms.

The first order of business was education. After several weeks of work, as the teens and younger adults worked with the children, the beginning stages of the council planned out a way to ensure that everyone got a full education. Classes would begin at age 5 and continue until age 20. Both magical and mundane subjects would be taught. Mundane subjects already had robot teachers programmed to help, but some of the other adults would have to become teachers.

* * *

For the two months or so, it was common for one of the teens to be woken up by a crying child. The children had been essentially kidnapped by Vault-Tech and missed their parents dearly. The initial excitement of being in a new place quickly wore off and all the adults were having a crash course on child rearing.

Some teens like Susan Bones or Hanna Abbot seemed to just slip into the role of caregiver well. They were both raised in households of generations of Hufflepuffs, which might have had something to do with it. As such, they were trained from a young age for unity, loyalty and hard work, something they used in their interactions with their assigned children. Others, like Hermione or Parvati, it wasn't so easy.

Hermione was the bossy type, not really the mothering type. If she had her own children, then she may have learned to be a mother, but it was not something that came naturally to her in an instant. As a result, she resented the fact that the girls were being pushed into the role. Some of them got along with her since they shared her love of reading and the best she could manage was story time with them. Not all of the kids she was assigned fit her lifestyle and she had a difficult time adapting.

Parvati just thought she was too old to take care of kids, an irony for a fifteen year old. She didn't have the patience for it and had very little interest in the instant-motherhood she gained. She slept in her assigned room with the four kids, but that was it. She didn't even really know their names.

Harry, after a few nights like the first, seemed perfect as a big brother figure. Maybe it was the fact he'd fought a dragon (which most of the kids thought was really cool), but there was just something about him that made other kids look up to him. Harry was nervous at first, but quickly realized the kids were looking up to him, not some fantasy character with a similar scar. He found himself telling them stories of his life and they always wanted more. He told them other stories too, but some of their requests were beyond him, especially the stories they wanted that had been told by parents or guardians.

His only hard time was with discipline. The kids he was responsible for were not always well behaved. Each kid was different and unfortunately Harry being a boy, he was giving a couple of "problem children" to take care of, a sister and brother a bit older than his other pair of siblings who had clung to him that night before. They were frequently fighting with each other. Harry turned to the older parents for help and adapted, though they continued to be a busy job.

Neville had a hard time. While he was a Gryffindor, he was not the most assertive of people and had rather poor self-esteem. He would have been perfectly willing to hide in his garden, but responsibilities were spread out among all the teens and single adults. The only saving grace was that his assigned children liked to play in the dirt just as much as he did. The first time a three year old crawled into his bed with him, he froze, staying awake for the entire night as he was completely unsure as to the right solution. Apparently just being there had been the right choice as the child seemed better in the morning. He'd relaxed since then, but he still didn't know how to relate.

Neville's worry and lack of self-confidence was rather ironic since his kids adored him. He'd never believe it if someone told him, but he was doing a great job.

"That's a nice pile of dirt you've got there, Molly" he said to a four year old he'd been assigned. He'd finally been able to convince the Overseer to allow him to use part of the athletic field as a garden. Neville had torn up the cricket field as no one there liked to play the sport, and mulched the sod. He spread the rest of the soil Harry and Hermione had bought from the Garden Store to increase the depth of the top spoil and started planting crops. Recombined generic foodstuffs was okay for some people, but there was a definite difference in taste. It had a sour, metallic tinge the machines attempted to cover up by adding too much sugar.

"It's a castle," she said.

"Oh really?" he asked.

"Yep, it's Hagwarz," she said.

"Do you mean Hogwarts?"

"Uh-huh," she said, nodding in agreement. Neville, never one to criticize, wisely refrained from informing the little girl that it looked nothing like Hogwarts. She was quite happy to see the lump of dirt as the magical castle she'd heard about and Neville didn't want to abuse her fantasy.

"Do you like plants?" he asked her.

"I like cherries!" she declared. "And raspberries and blueberries and applies and peaches."

"So, fruit then?" he asked.

"Yup!" she replied with a big grin.

"Do you want to help me plant some fruit trees?" he asked, kneeling down in the dirt to look her in the eye. He glanced to where his other four were playing. They were playing in the mud, soaked to the skin with their jumpsuits plastered against their bodies. Molly thought about it and nodded eagerly.

"_Yeah_!" she exclaimed, her face full of childish glee. Unlike most of the other adults, Neville always included his kids in whatever he was doing be it moving supplies or digging in the dirt, which ironically made him one of the most popular caregivers. Kids love getting dirty.

"Kids, over here!" he called out, waving them over. Dressed more in mud than clothes, they ran over with big grins.

"We need to go pick up some seedlings from the biological research station. Want to help me carry them?" he asked. To his relief, they threw their hands up in the air and screamed with glee. For some reason they really liked the BRS. It made them giggle with the silly names it called them, though for some reason a lot of the girls Neville's age or older didn't like it at all. Even when one considered how much there was to learn about it, Hermione avoided the Biological Research Station like it had dragon pox.

"Hey handsome," it said in its deep baritone. "Ready to give me your seed?"

"Not just yet, we're still deciding what plants we need the most of, so we're picking up more seedlings," Neville replied with a blush. While it was flattering, he didn't really consider himself handsome.

"Now boyo, I'm always looking for more of your seed, but don't forget what I said about my Salient Green, if you need more of the same seeds, that's your ticket," the BRS replied. "But that's for later, what are you looking for today, my sexy, sexy man?"

"Apples, pears, peaches, oranges," Neville replied, pointedly ignoring the station's comment. "You did say you'd have them ready today."

"I did and I _do_, Love Buns," it replied. "Your pretty little bundles of joy are right over in that sweet, sweet soil you brought in."

Neville shrugged. "It's just dragon dung and composted sod," he said humbly.

"I know, I know, but handsome, that cuts down my production time from three days to two!" it replied. "But what else does a sexy seed taking, plant making machine deserve?"

"Nothing but the best!" Molly replied excitedly.

"Thanks Lollypop," it replied. "You all be careful with my babies, now."

"Yes sir!" they all chorused in cherubic glee.

Neville grinned before he started passing out the flower pots to transport the seedlings. He carefully dug up each one and deposited it into a child's pot. Once they were all filled and he had his own prepared, they marched in single file back to the edges of the athletic field. Neville chuckled lightly at the children's excitement.

Unlike crops, the trees were chosen to both produce fruit and brighten up the place. With this in mind, they had made planters out of the various crates Harry and Hermione had smuggled in, since they were no longer needed for the drinks, food, books and other assorted purchases. Neville carefully mulched the sod from the cricket field, blended it with the dragon dung and filled the crates up. Each one would have a tree that would eventually produce fruit.

Thanks to the BRS, they could use a simple prepackaged salad or other concoction from the dwindling stock of fresh produce in the galley to clone new versions. Lettuce was an early creation that was constantly being replanted, with at least half of the crop being left to go to seed, which would produce more. Carrots, celery, tomatoes and others were similarly cloned and planted. Using a selection of stasis spells, they were creating a seed bank that would allow them to preserve food they wanted to clone until the BRS was ready for a new batch.

The fresh fruit was chosen specifically since they were varieties which had been selected for taste and production over generations. The seeds were extracted and the fruit taken to the BRS. Most fruit does not produce the same variety if one simply planted the seeds. Apples have immense diversity so no matter if it's a golden delicious, a Granny-smith, a Black Oxford, an Old Thompson or a Macintosh, the trees grown from the seeds have little resemblance to the parent. Normally this would be done through more primitive forms of cloning plants, such as cutting or grafting. With the BRS, that wasn't necessary as it's genetic analysis technology allowed perfect cloning. Otherwise they would have ended up what some call "line apples" that could easily have poor flavor, be hard or might even be extra tart.

Other field crops such as corn, wheat and oats were cloned and planted as well. These revealed yet another problem: they needed space to grow.

* * *

Dean Thomas had done what many thought was impossible.

He, a Gryffindor, had become friends with Blaise Zabini, a tried and true Slytherin (as opposed to the Nott/Malfoy type, which were "Legacy Slytherins" and not quite the same quality).

It had started out with them sharing a room the first night, then having adjoining flats when they were set up in the family tents. The Thomas family of four, Dean, his two little sister and his mother, was to the left and the Zabini family of seven, Blaise, his mother, three younger sisters, (the next eldest being Elaine Bitoni, who bore her father's name), and two little brothers barely out of diapers. The others kept their mother's name just as Blaise had.

When the kids were assigned to group play for a few hours in the middle of the day, the two of them often ended up having a cup in the cafe. They talked about their various interests, mostly art (Dean liked to create it, Blaise liked to look at it), football (Dean followed Manchester United, while Zabini was a long time fan of the Hammers), Quidditch (both followed the Hollyhead Harpies because they were hormonal teenage boys), and vault life.

"You know what I miss most of all?" Dean said one day.

"What?" Zabini asked.

"Meat," Dean replied.

"Meat? We had meat just the other day," Zabini replied.

"No, we had Cram, which I'm not sure actually contains any meat, and some frozen, poorly-seasoned chicken breast the size of a baby's palm ," Dean replied. "No, I'm talking a nice big juicy steak like we used to have sometimes at Hogwarts."

"That's not likely to happen any time soon," Blaise cautioned. "We're locked in an iron and lead vault. I seriously doubt they'd just let us crack open the door for some dinner."

"I know, but I got to thinking, we've got magic," Dean replied.

"Sure, but I also know you know, it's impossible to conjure or transfigure food," his friend reminded him.

"True, _if_ we're using transfiguration," Dean replied. "You see, I was thinking about it. I know for a fact that there is a way to get some true red meat in here."

"Oh, 'for a fact?'" Blaise asked before he took a sip of his tea.

"Yep, candy?" Dean asked, holding up a box. Blaise shrugged.

"Sure, I guess, never had muggle candy before," he replied taking one from the box and popping it in his mouth.

Unfortunately for them both, it wasn't candy, but Mentats someone had stashed in a candy tin.

"Oh, so that makes so much sense," Zabini replied a while later, slapping a hand down on the table. "Of course that's how it works. Especially when you consider the arthrimatic calculations of the modified spell."

"See, I knew what I was talking about," Dean said. "We should really do everyone a favor and expand the diet. I mean, we can't just rely on the extruders' porridge and whatever Neville can produce, and that's not much. I mean, I need something more than Cram and Salisbury Steak."

"When you're right, you're right," Blaise replied with a nod. "We should head down to the fields and do that right now. Steak for dinner!"

"Hey, if we modify it, we might even be able to summon pigs for bacon and ham," Dean said.

"Okay," Blaise said, looking at the ceiling as he did the calculations in his head. "Carry the two, divide by 4 in base six. Oh, of course. That makes perfect sense."

The looks Penelope Clearwater and Nymphadora Tonks gave them suggested they were not making sense at all.

"I thought Hermione and Susan said neither one took Arthrimancy?" Nymphadora asked.

"As far as I know they didn't," Penelope replied, giving the two boys a wary eye. "As head girl, I tutored third years in Arthrimancy and I don't remember them being there."

"Do you think we should stop them?" the auror asked. Penelope shrugged.

"You're the one they made chief of security based on your badge," the blonde woman replied. "I'm just a lowly librarian's assistant."

"You're only a librarian's assistant because it lets you stay in the library and read most of the day," her metamorphic friend pointed out.

"Precisely," she said with a sly smile that held absolutely no shame. "Which means, my job is more awesome." They glanced up and realized Blaise and Dean, both still tripping on Mentats, had left. Tonks frowned.

"I really am going to have to track them down, won't I?" she asked. Penelope gave a silently nod.

"Well, I'm off," Tonks said, standing up. She nodded to the Mr. Handy cook behind the counter and made her way through the winding corridors of the vault until she spotted the two boys turning a corner up ahead.

"We need more room, but the fourteen foot ceilings of the fields should be sufficient," Dean said.

"I agree, though we should keep in mind the specific description involved when the information was related to us," Blaise said. "Could I have another of those candies? They're quite good. They make everything so tingly."

"Oh, sure, here," Dean said opening the box for Blaise before taking another himself. "As I was saying, that was, I believe, a singular, isolated event. If we take appropriate action and follow up, the results should fit our hypothesis."

"Indeed," Blaise replied. Together they walked out into the middle of the field, ignoring the little kids playing football. They pulled out their wands and deliberately mispronounced a spell in a way they were specifically cautioned not to in their first year.

"_Wingardium Leviofa!_" With a swish and a flick, the two boys found themselves being crushed by buffalo. Dean had a particularly ornery American Bison, while Blaise was struggling under a water buffalo that was looking around at its new surroundings with confusion.

Tonks, not having been close enough to stop them, sighed and pulled out her mirror.

"Tonks to medical, we've got an emergency on the field," she said. A moment later, the mirror showed her mother working in the clinic.

"What is it Nymphadora?" her mother asked through the mirror.

"Please state the nature of the medical emergency," the auto-doc said at the same time.

"Two idiots summoned wild animals that landed on their chests," Nymphadora replied. "They're still alive, but in serious condition by the looks of it."

"Hit them with stasis charms and I'll be there as soon as I can," Andromeda replied with a tired sigh.

"I'll leave them where they are since I have to keep some children from getting gored," her daughter replied. "Tonks out."

The metamorphic witch ran out onto the field and levitated the water buffalo off of Zabini while Susan Bones conjured a wall of earth to keep the bison from running her over. Even so, it buckled and fractured when the bison rammed it with its head.

"Look at the animal!" one kid yelled from behind them, running passed their caretakers. Susan jumped down, and tackled the kid to the ground. Hannah Abbot stood right next to her friend and hit the huge animal with a jelly legs hex. The massive creature, suddenly unable to hold its great weight up, fell, snapping its front legs with disturbing cracks. It screamed in pain, a long wail that echoed across the walls and ceiling, causing more children to pause and look.

"No! Don't get close to it!" Tonks warned, throwing up a solid shield around the panicked water buffalo. She quickly cast another spell which conjured up a fence strong enough to contain the animal before turning to the bison that was still screaming in pain. Not knowing what to do, Tonks hit it with stunner after stunner until it finally fell over unconscious.

* * *

In the past month Andromeda began to feel like a first year again. When the peace accords between the Overseer and the Dwellers came into place, she really started to feel how different the muggle creation was when compared to the magical homes she grew up in as a child and lived in as an adult. She'd been in muggle homes before and she understood the inconvenience of having to physically switch on a light, but the Vault was different.

Everything was connected. Wires brought electricity and Terminal network connections through the walls. Pipes brought in water and took away waste. In her childhood home, everything had worked together, but it was made up of hundreds of spells over the years; it was a lot like making a jigsaw puzzle, but never using more than one piece from a single puzzle and hoping everything fit together. In the Vault, each piece had been designed to fit the others around it, like it was made up of pieces all from the same picture, but cut different ways.

Being a healer, it was understood that she would be working in the Medical Clinic. It had all the latest advances in medical technology, with the extensive pre- and post-natal wards as well as a very advanced auto-doc, some kind of muggle medical healer thing. Apparently it could even change how you looked and give hair cuts.

She's spent the last month learning as much as she could about muggle medicine from the robots to the meds to the chems and all the dangers involved. There were so many things that muggles had easier, but many things that were harder as well.

But today, after a month of nothing more than scrapes, bumps and bruises, was a real medical emergency.

Andy Tonks, registered Healer, wasn't sure if she was ready. She watched her daughter's face vanish from the mirror and shivered. They didn't have half the supplies she was used to and she knew she didn't qualify as a muggle healer. She had worked for almost two decades in the long term care ward, not trauma medicine, and hadn't assisted with anything rushed since she was a trainee way back when. After a bit of deliberation, Andromeda decided to go with a bit of muggle medicine she knew worked.

The stimpak.

One muggle creation Andromeda Tonks loved was the stimpak.

A needle, something that a part of her still thought was barbaric, could inject a medicine that would instantly start to stimulate growth and repair tissue. Better and faster than a blood replenishing potion, really, since it would close wounds even as it stimulated the body to produce blood.

It did not, however, cure broken bones or diseases like magic could, but nothing was perfect. Luckily, she'd roped her husband, who had worked in St. Mungo's potions store, the magical equivalent of a pharmacy or chemist, into brewing as many of the more commonly used potions as they had resources for.

However, they had only one single dose of Skelegrow.

They had enough supplies to make another dose, but it had been decided to save them. Since they had cloning technology, they'd wisely decided to save a little of each ingredient Hermione or others had smuggled in. The BRS had been working hard on medicinal plants, while its animal counterpart had started creating certain creatures based on the samples provided. None were born yet, but the artificial wombs were growing nicely.

If they had brewed that second dose, it would mean there would be no more ever again.

And now they had a double trauma situation.

Which meant it was up to Andromeda Tonks to decide who got the potion and who had to trust the auto-doc did what it said it could. She grabbed a handful of stimpaks from the first aid kit and ran down the hall, her white coat trailing behind her.

"Out of the way," she said, rushing down the hallway. She nearly ran into Helen Granger's elderly mother, but manged to right both of them before they fell.

"Sorry," Andy said as she started running down the hall once more. When she finally got to the fields, she saw the animals surrounded by rings of children with a smaller ring staring down in horror. "Kids, I need you to get out of the way," Andy commanded as she rushed in. She handed her daughter a stimpak and together they jammed the needles into the boys and injected the liquid. "Explain!"

"They summoned those animals, somehow, it wasn't a conjuration or transfiguration," her daughter replied. "The animals fell on them, sending them down. Damage looked similar to a bludgeoning hex so I cast first aid charms for that kind of trauma."

"Well done," her mother said. Andy flicked her wand at the Zabini boy and his pelvis, lower ribs and hips glowed an angry red, his head a sharp yellow, while the rest of him had a blue green shimmer. "Severe trauma to the pelvis and ribcage." She flicked her wand. "Same results with Thomas boy. Both have some kind of unknown substance in their system. Broken bones, some internal bleeding. Nymphadora, gently levitate the Thomas boy and bring him to a bed in the clinic."

"I'll follow with Zabini," Harry Potter volunteered, having run over when he saw the commotion. Nymphadora nodded and went as fast as she could without further injuring Dean. Dean's two sisters followed quickly behind him, tears streaming down their faces.

"Bones, Abbot!" Andromeda snapped. "Take the kids back to their rooms. We'll talk to them about what happened later. Longbottom, Granger! If the animals wake up, hit them with stunners! Lovegood! Go fetch the boys' mothers to the Clinic."

The teens nodded and rushed to comply. Andy didn't stay and rushed after the two boys. Susan and Hannah quickly gathered the children into groups and started back towards the living quarters. It was a little like herding cats with all the fear and excitement in the air. Handling a few children who just experienced something traumatic can be difficult, but the vault had almost six times as many children as adults. It didn't help that the clinic was in the same basic section as the living quarters.

Andromeda took the steps two at a time. She slowed down when she was right behind Potter and Zabini. She watched as her daughter had to yell at people to get out of the way. Eventually they arrived at the clinic.

"Please state the nature of the medical emergency," the Auto-Doc said in a slightly annoyed tone.

"Put them on beds, gently," Andy cautioned, ignoring the machine. She did a few diagnostic charms again, getting improved, but not perfect results. "Potter, go to the cabinet, potion bottle, looks like gray milk with black specks floating in it. Bring it to me."

He rushed over and passed her the bottle. She uncorked it and stuffed it into Dean's mouth. She checked the charms and noted it was working. His damage was more extensive, seeing as he had the larger animal fall on him. The healer couldn't work on them when they had stasis charms, but luckily she only really had to worry about one of them now.

"Potter, pass me the bottle labeled Med-X," Andy commanded, as she stood over Zabini. She held out her hand impatiently as Harry rifled through the cabinet until he finally found the bottle. He thrust it into her hand. "Pass me that sterile syringe."

One thing muggles did better than magical healing was sedation. Sure, you could hit someone with a stunner, but that could sometimes do more damage than it helped. Also, anyone who ever had to regrow a bone could tell you that it hurt like a son of a bitch. When Potter slapped the sterile syringe into her hand she carefully measured out what the auto-doc said was a safe dosage for a person the patient's size. Grabbing the boy's arm, she felt for a vein. Finally finding one, she pressed the needle in, injecting the sedative.

Zabini groaned.

"Potter, I need you to hold him down," Andy told the teen. "Press down on his shoulders, don't let him try to sit up. I have to cast charms to set his bones."

The boy nodded and pressed down on Zabini's shoulders, keeping the boy in place. Andy cast a spell that made flesh and clothing transparent to her eyes. Despite herself, she winced as she saw the extent of the damage. She magically grabbed the boy's broken ribs through his skin and moved them into place. She noted the internal bleeding and growled.

"Auto-doc, how are you on crippled limbs and broken bones?" she asked.

"I am programmed with all the most advanced techniques," it replied.

"He has hip and rib trauma, can you heal him if he can't stand up?" Andy asked.

"Of course, it is a simple procedure,"

"Even with internal bleeding?"

"Certainly," it replied. The cylinder spun around in place, showing a semi-vertical table with a few clamps. "Simply lock the patient into the restraints and I will go to work."

"I've already given him a dose of Med-X," she replied.

"Thank you for the information," it replied. Andy nodded to Harry and her daughter.

"Potter, you and I will get his shoulders. Nymphadora, hold his legs steady, minimize the movement of the pelvis," the healer said. "He's lucky to be alive at all at the moment. We don't want to do any more damage."

Together, the three of them managed to move Zabini into the auto-doc and get him strapped in.

"Please step away from the door," the Auto-doc replied. "This procedure could take as long as four hours."

"I don't need the details at the moment, just do it," Andy snapped. She heard the door latch and she let out a breath. She walked backwards until she hit the wall and slumped into a chair. She made a vague motion for her assistants to sit down as well. If she was right, Dean would be waking up screaming from the pain any time. She glanced out the window to the waiting room where the Thomas and Zabini families were running around worriedly.

"Potter, go to the cabinet again," Healer Tonks said. "Look for a green bottle with blue pills. When Dean Thomas wakes up give him _one_ of those pills. No more until I say he can have more."

Andy pushed herself upwards and walked into the next room where the mothers of both patients waited impatiently.

"Your boys did something extraordinarily stupid," she replied. "I don't know what they were thinking, but both of them are extremely lucky to survive having animals that large land on them."

"Are they going to be okay?" Dean's mother Jan asked. According to the medical charts she'd read, genetically Jan was a squib, though she was born of muggle parents. Genetics was a difficult thing to get your head around.

"Dean should be fine, though he's going to be in pain for some time due to the potions and the accident," Andromeda replied. "When he's completely healed, he's going to regret it, since I'll ask him exactly what he was thinking."

"And Blaise?" the boy's mother asked.

"Unfortunately, we only had one bottle of Skelegrow," Andy explained. The pureblood woman looked at her with shock. Andy ignored the look and pressed on. "Dean's injuries were more severe, so I gave him the potion. Blaise is in surgery at the moment, so I can't say for absolutely certain, but I have high hopes for him."

"Surgery?" Elaine, Blaise's eldest sister asked. There was a scream of pain. They glanced inside and saw Harry giving Dean the aforementioned pain meds. Dean grumbled a bit but eventually went back to sleep.

"The clinic is equipped with a muggle item called an Auto-Doc," Andy said. "I don't know exactly how it works, but the few muggles I've talked to about them tell me they are quite possibly the best medicine in the muggle world."

"Muggle-"

"Madame Zabini," Andromeda said sharply at the woman's deriding tone. "Your son is in the best care we can give him at the moment. Your son, both of your sons actually, used an unknown spell and each summoned an animal that outweighed them severely. The animals landed in their laps. Do you have _any_ idea how amazingly lucky they are to be alive at all at the moment?"

"You should ha-"

"Don't you _dare_ blame me for this, Zabini," Andy growled, taking a step into the woman's personal space. "Don't you _dare_. Don't even hint it, because other than that muggle machine you were so quick to dismiss, I'm the _only_ healer in this vault. I used everything I knew and have learned since I got here to save him. If he dies, you have only your own son to blame."

The woman snapped her jaw shut, but glared at Healer Tonks.

"He should be out within four hours, probably less," she continued. "Now, I will be in my office going over records and holodisks. I was putting off trauma medicine, but after today, I'll push it up on my schedule." She walked over to the clinic door and poked her head in. "When Dean wakes up, come get me."

"Sure thing, Mum," Nymphadora said, giving her mother a nod as she slipped into her office. The younger Tonks woman turned to Harry. "Doesn't look like we'll need more help, so why don't you go see what's happened with the animals."

"Sure," Harry said. "Tell me when Dean wakes up."

"No problem," she agreed.

* * *

By the time Harry arrived back at the athletic fields, the children were already back in the living quarters where some of the adults were talking the event over with them. All he found were Neville, Hermione and the blonde Ravenclaw girl she didn't know that well, Luna Lovegood. The children loved her stories of strange animals and convoluted conspiracies (one of which had the children almost religiously brushing their teeth after every meal), but other than that Harry had hardly even talked to her.

"How are they?" Hermione asked.

"Dean should be fine, he's sleeping at the moment," Harry said. "Blaise is in surgery in the Auto-Doc."

"Otto-Dock?" Neville asked. "Is that like a German warf?"

"It's like a robot healer," Hermione explained.

"Oh," Neville said.

"The auto-doc seemed to think it was fairly routine surgery, but there's always some worry," Harry said. He looked over to where the incident occurred and noticed the water buffalo happily munching on the grass. The bison was still unconscious, resting on its side. "So, what's the deal with the animals?"

"They're real," Luna replied. "I think we should call the water buffalo Mozzarella."

"Why?" Neville asked.

"Because mozzarella cheese is made from the milk of Water Buffalos," the girl replied simply.

"Makes sense," Harry said, before giving the animals another, closer inspection. "What do you mean they're real? I thought they were just magical creations?"

"We've tried to dispel them like we do transfigurations, but it's not working," Hermione said. "I tried a few spells and everything tells me they're real animals."

"Damn," Harry said.

"What?"

"_Dean_ of all people comes up with a spell that seems to create food, but it could kill you if you cast it," Harry explained.

"Do you remember that warning Professor Flitwick gave us when we were learning the levitation charm?" Hermione asked.

"Um... no."

"Ron was casting it wrong and I corrected him and-"

"And he was a berk, you fled and then Quirrel let the troll in," Harry said as he walked over to the paddock with the happily browsing cattle. "I'm not about to forget that day, I just don't remember much other than the troll in the bathroom."

"Well, I suppose it did overshadow the day," Hermione admitted. Harry gave her a disbelieving look. Hermione threw her arms up. "Okay, that's all I really remember from that day, too. But I took notes when Professor Flitwick was talking about it. The charm, if you said the incantation wrong summons a buffalo. I think that's what they did."

"Those are both buffalo?" Neville asked. "They don't look anything alike."

"Well, buffalo is really just a generic term for an animal that was used for making buff coats," Hermione explained as they walked over to the unconscious bison. "Different species, both sometimes called Buffalo. The bigger one's an American Bison. There's also the Cape Buffalo, but they didn't summon one of them."

"Oh," Neville said. "But what are we going to do? I mean, it's not really safe to have around here."

"And from what I saw, it doesn't really make sense for us to try and heal up the bison," Harry put in.

"What?" the girls asked.

"We don't have a lot of supplies, Mrs. Tonks doesn't really know that much about muggle medicine, even if she is a healer," Harry said. "It doesn't make sense to keep it around. Plus, big animals can be dangerous."

"The boy's got a point," Hermione's maternal grandfather walked over slowly. He was still getting used to walking without arthritis, but was speeding up all the time. The old man slowly walked around the item. "A wound like that could take months to heal. All the while it's unable to stand up. Safest and most humane thing would be to put it down." He bent slightly and poked its side with his cane. "Sure is a big fella, though."

"One of the biggest animals I've ever seen that wasn't trying to kill me," Harry said. Hermione chuckled with dark humor.

"Oh, bison are quite dangerous, most don't like people," the old man said as he bent down to look at the injury closer. "Ew, that's quite bad. Yep, keeping it alive is probably a bad idea. They've been known to gore people, especially the bulls." He glanced at the teens. "I might not look it now, but I used to be quite the hunter. Learned all about wild animals. Dabbled in taxidermy for a while."

"He's got all these dead animals all over the place," Hermione said. "It's a bit creepy in early morning light."

"Not really an issue in here," Neville said.

"True, but it was really scary when I was six," Hermione replied. "I stayed awake all night once."

"Oh, you did okay," her grandfather said with a grin. "She thought my standing bear was an attacker and came to get me. She was so worked up, she turned the bear from a European brown bear into a Sun bear." He paused to glance at his blushing granddaughter. "Didn't make much sense at the time, but it makes a bit more sense these days."

He stood up and stretched his back. "But no, it's too dangerous to keep and it would be cruel to try. Best to put it down and use what we can from it."

"We should call Professor Flitwick and ask him about it," Hermione suggested. "He might be able to tell us more."

"Good idea," Harry said. "Let's call him on the mirror tonight."

* * *

Dean woke up in pain. A lot of pain. He could honestly say it was more pain than he had ever felt before.

"I think it would be best for you to lie back and rest," Andromeda Tonks told him.

"Everything hurts," he whispered back.

"I'm not surprised especially considering you summoned a bison on your chest," the healer replied drolly. "Care to explain the thought process that brought you to that incredibly stupid conclusion?"

"Umm..." he started. He let his head fall back on the pillow annd closed his eyes. "Meat."

"Meat?"

"Yeah, I wanted some real meat," Dean replied. "And I had this idea about using magic to get one."

"Transfiguration and conjuration cannot food make," Andromeda reminded him.

"Yeah, that's why I wasn't going to use that," Dean said. "And I wanted to do... something. I can't remember what it was. Something about something Professor Flitwick did or said. It's really hard to remember now."

"And so you cast this spell, that you don't even remember, that worked, but had the side effect of having an animal that weighs possibly ten times as much as you do, land on your chest," Andromeda Tonks finished for him in an exasperated tone. She ran her hands through her hair as she paced about.

"Do you have ANY idea how stupid that was?" she demanded. "Your sisters were watching! Merlin, Luna Lovegood lost her mother because of a spell accident! You almost killed yourself with an untested, and unsafe spell right in front of them!"

"It... it just seemed like a good idea at the time," Dean replied.

"Well, next time you have a good idea 'at the time' bring it in front of the council," the healer informed him. "We'll decide if it's a good idea or not. Luckily some people figured out what your incantation was."

"So, it worked?" Dean asked.

"Yes, which is why you're in the Clinic!" she snapped.

"Still, it's kind of cool," he replied.

"You almost died!" she protested at the blasé reaction of her patient. A closer inspection revealed he wasn't even paying attention to her, but was in the process of focusing his eyes on some spot on the ceiling. "Are you even paying attention?"

* * *

After wasting a few minutes attempting to get the boy to pay attention to the severity of the situation, Andromeda gave up and went back to the waiting room. "Mr. Thomas is awake. He's not making sense, so just bare with him."

"The chems," the boy's mother said, escorting her daughters in. As soon as they were inside, Andromeda Tonks turned to Blaise's mother.

"The Auto-Doc just reported that your son will be out of surgery in the next few minutes," she explained. "It might be some time before he will wake up. I'll be in my office if you have any questions."

The healer walked into the clinic office, leaned back in the very comfortable office chair and promptly fell asleep.

* * *

The next few days were not pleasant ones for the two boys. Blaise was in strict bed-rest after taking three stimpaks post surgery. Dean was kept in the next bed for observation. Their mothers informed them of the stupidity of their choices. It was clear that the boys could not remember exactly how they had come to the decision to cast the spell, but that it had something to do with arthrimancy and other things the boys barely understood beyond the basics.

The stress and exhaustion of the procedures had Andromeda come to a conclusion. After much thought, she brought it up before the council.

"I need an assistant," she said. She paused and sighed. "Actually, preferably three to five assistants."

"Menelaus and I are dentists, we might not have the same kind of expertise, but we can certainly assist where we can," Helen volunteered.

"I need someone to help me with all the procedures and medicines and all the other options," the healer replied.

"Certainly," Menelaus replied. "We should probably set up our practice as well. I've noticed that dental hygene does not seem to be a priority in the magical world."

"Thank you, but I still feel I need assistants, people to train," Andromeda explained. "I am the only healer here. Many people know home remedies or a few potions, but Ted and I are the only ones who really know what we're doing."

Snape snorted. As usual during these meetings, he was lurking in the corner. He usually had little input other than snide comments, but while they would never allow him to be a teacher of children, or even remotely to be in charge of them, they could not deny he was skilled at his craft. Andromeda's request to have him confined had been narrowly overruled. It was already clear that there were factions developing among the adults.

"Do you have something to add, Mr. Snape?" the Overseer asked dryly. A few short conversations had soured any chance of respect for the potions master.

"A glorified cook and a nurse are in charge of our health," the man replied.

"I'll have you know, that I am fully certified and I've worked at St. Mungo's for nearly thirty years as potions distributor," Ted Tonks snapped, his professional pride having taken a blow. "Any one who has been treated at that hospital has probably taken potions I brewed. I might not be able to brew every little thing or make new potions, I'm not an innovator, but I _am_ the most skilled person in the vault when it comes to medicinal potions, Snape. Don't you _dare_ hint otherwise. I'll let my wife defend her own reputation, though I doubt there is any need seeing as she just saved two lives!"

"Indeed, I don't think there is any need for that," Madame Zabini replied. "Healer Tonks has been quite forthright about her flaws and what she intends to do to correct them. I was hesitant when she mentioned the muggle creations, but my concerns were unnecessary. My son is alive and will return to full health after his bout of stupidity. I have no issue with her skill."

"It seems to me we need to get ready for school," Menelaus' step-father put in. He was easily the oldest man in the vault and had lived a full life. While there was some distrust of him because he had no magic, that was changing. "We have skills, skills we should pass on. If we die, the vault loses those skills. We teach the younger generations what we know. I know you've all seen the class rooms and laboratories. Andromeda is a Healer, I was a biologist before my retirement. My son and Helen are dentists. We need to pass this on."

"I agree," Mary said. "We might not have masteries in our fields, but we should still teach as much as we know."

"I agree, though we need to make sure we can actually teach," Elijah said, his eyes flicking over to Snape. "While some are quite skilled, they aren't suitable to teach children the basics. Also, most of these children would be back at school had we not taken residence here."

"Well then," the Overseer said as Sally dutifully took the meeting's notes. "We should start planning on classes. For a number of classes we have robots programmed to teach regular classes. I'm sure the medical assistants would be willing to help Mrs. Tonks with instructing a new medical staff. At certain times we can use the class rooms for magical subjects."

"I do believe a few of the older children are ready for wands," Ollivander replied. "While Hogwarts begins at eleven, that is not to say children cannot learn spells at a younger age. Indeed, it's quite common that magical families teach younger children household charms."

"Weren't there laws against that?" Menelaus asked. He paused as he looked back on the last few weeks. "Laws we've pretty much ignored since the door closed."

"The whole point many of us moved here was to get away from the Ministry," Penelope replied before pausing. "Well, that and we wanted to live through the nuclear fallout. But the point is those laws don't apply in here. And while it was against the law, it was rarely enforced in magical areas."

"What?" every parent of a muggleborn asked in shock.

"I was quite angry when I found out," Penelope admitted. She glanced around and noticed a few of the magical faces had the good graces to look guilty of the uneven enforcement. "Harry told me about how a house elf set off the alarms back before his second year. That doesn't happen in magical homes, or else they'd be sending letters constantly. That's only one example. It's no wonder that certain children from certain families return after a year with a whole slew of new spells and hexes." Her eyes flickered to Snape's with a little glare. He simply sneered back.

"Indeed," Ollivander agreed. "It is more a matter of emotional maturity rather than any sort of special age. In general eleven year old children are trusted to use their wand responsibly. That is, of course, rarely the case."

As few people chuckled at that when they thought back to their own first year.

"Headmaster Dumbledore did give us a full collection of the Hogwarts library," Helen put in. Heads turned in shock. "Oh... Did you not know that? I didn't think it was a secret."

"The whole thing?" Mary Davis asked. "Even the restricted section?"

"Yes, also the professor's personal collections, the Black library and several other personal libraries of certain Order members," Snape cut in. "Yes, even the restricted section. Honestly, do you think I'm always brewing potions? I have plenty of time to study on what has been added."

"Wonderful, that makes me feel so safe," Andromeda drawled. The tension was like electricity in the air and no one said anything for a while.

"I've been meaning to ask," Mrs. Thomas asked, raising a hand, "what happened to my son's bison?"

"Galley, the kitchen Mr. Handy, Harry and I took care of it," Helen's father explained. At the shocked looks, he just shrugged. "It needed to be put down. Doing anything else would have been cruel. With Mr. Potter's help, I broke it down. I saved anything that was worthwhile and got rid of the rest. The bones are being ground up to go into Mr. Longbottom's fertilizer. The meat and offal are in the freezer. We had it tested and it seems perfectly safe to eat. I'm teaching Harry how to tan the hide. It wasn't easy, but with a few gumped up chemicals I was able to make the right mix."

"Oh, so what are we going to do with the rest?" Mrs. Thomas asked.

"Eat it I imagine," he replied with a chuckle.

"I don't think Dean needs any," the boy's mother commented. "But he can watch as the rest of us eat it."

There were a few chuckles around the table. "Oh, I agree," Madame Zabini agreed. "Our sons need a good look. Perhaps a thin porridge or um... what was it? Ah, Nutrient gruel for a few weeks."

"Perfect," Mrs. Thomas with an evil smirk.

"What about cloning?" Menelaus' step-father asked. "While it takes time, we could raise a few through cloning as a steady source of meat."

"It is possible," the Overseer replied. "I'm not sure the artificial womb is large enough, but there might be a way to build something bigger. What about the water buffalo?"

"Mozzarella is doing well, though she's been having a bit of a war with Moe," Nymphadora said, chuckling at the confused looks she got at that. "Moe is the robot that mows the grass and Mozzarella is the cow. Luna Lovegood named her. Mozz and Moe are both competing for the same territory and Moe really doesn't like it when he runs into a cow paddy."

"But it's fine? No magical degradation or ill health?" someone asked.

"No, as far as I can tell, and granted I only took Care up to OWLs," the Auror replied, "it appears to be a real, live, healthy, but very hungry water buffalo."

"A shame we don't have a milker," someone said.

"Luna Lovegood's been doing it by hand," Nymphadora replied. "Right into a bucket. I'm not sure where she's going to get the mix to turn it into cheese, but she's going to try."

"So, a steady source of meat, if you're willing to nearly die to provide it," the Overseer commented. "Let's not do that again except as a last result. Any other issues?"

"I have one," Sally said. "There are too many people in here. We're eating way too much food. The processing machines can't make enough."

"We're not really that many more than you were expecting," Velma Greengrass argued.

"But then you brought owls and those cat-sneezel things and no one's paying attention to the regulated serving size, just eating whenever and how much you want," Sally said in her cutie-baby voice, ignoring when a number of people corrected her on the name of the magical cats. "And now there's this cow. We have more people, all their pets and you're cloning plants, which takes up more resources. Salient green isn't cheap, people!"

"We're making food already, Neville has a whole garden he's planting," Penelope argued.

"You really think a few leaves of lettuce are really going to fix things?" Sally asked. "No, if anything because you grew a little bit of food, people are actually eating more because it tastes good! And no one is even using the hydroponics lab for growing food! I checked this morning: except for the original plants it's empty! If we'd been growing in there all along, we might have had enough, but nooo, you all knew better than little ole me!"

The council was silent. It was about half way split between them being shocked that Sally was actually right about something and being shocked at the possibility of starving to death.

"There were reasons I had my rules and my sizes! I was trained to manage the day to day life! Almost no one does the mandatory exercise and you're eating too much," Sally said. "You're all going to be fat blobs that die of heart disease!"

"How much do we have?" the Overseer asked, quickly diverting from Sally's comments.

"If we eat like we have been, two months," Sally replied.

"Two _months_?" people demanded.

"Why didn't you tell us this earlier?" Andromeda asked. "Perhaps when it was possible to fix the problem in time?"

"I just got the computer report this morning. It's a monthly report," the blonde administrator explained. "It tells me that we need to change things a lot. Shorter showers, smaller portions. People actually doing their assigned jobs."

"Write up a list of proposals, magical and non," the Overseer commanded. "Brainstorm tonight. Bring it to the meeting tomorrow. Don't talk about this because it will just create panic."

"Why can't we just open the door and go get food?" someone asked. Sally and the Overseer shook their heads.

"We can't trust that the door will shut securely enough afterward," the Overseer replied. "Also, Vault-Tech might easily see this as a breech of contract and replace us. Possibly punishing some of you for smuggling."

"We would also then be subject to the whims of the Ministry," Ted put in. There were a lot of sour faces at that.

"Don't hash this out tonight. Brainstorm, don't cause a panic. When we have a plan, we'll explain it to everyone," Andromeda said, finding herself in the strange position of agreeing with the Vault-Tech employees.

* * *

Luckily, Hermione came through for the vault again.

It had been three weeks before she actually manged to go through the trunk of books from the Hogwarts Library. Just as Dumbledore had said, right on top was a book on the history, application and cautions of Expansion Charms.

The charms were easy enough. Like many effect charms, they required runic arrays to keep them permanent. The book explained them in detail and even Hermione with her only two years of Ancient Runes could inscribe them easily enough. After very little deliberation, the Council decided to go along with expansion of the Vault. Since it wouldn't take up any extra space on the outside, there wasn't any reason why it shouldn't work. After all, it had been used in the Ministry for centuries and Hogwarts for over a millennium.

Unfortunately, those over eager witches and wizards forgot that none of these buildings had modern muggle conveniences like electricity or indoor plumbing. Oh, sure, most magical homes had plumbing, but they were enchanted from start to finish to move things a long. Muggles used pumps.

When Hermione and Harry, who had done the actual casting, started on the expansion charms, they cast the charm as the book described and hiked the long, long way down the hallway to the other end.

Hermione blinked at the sudden darkness before her, only light from behind them giving any illumination.

"Harry! Isn't this a bit off?" Hermione asked.

"A bit yes, but I thought I had it right," he replied, pointing to the tiny specks far, far above them as they walked through the darkened hallway. "But a-whoa!"

Harry caught himself before he fell over the precipice and into the gigantic pit he'd created. Backing away from the edge, he tripped and fell on his back.

"Okay," Hermione said with a gulp as she looked _down_. "That was a good first try." She swallowed as she leaned over the edge to look up in hopes of seeing the top of the room Harry had created. "But this time let's focus on length rather than full size.

"What are we going to do with that pit?" Menelaus asked in confusion, looking over the grass clinging feebly to the walls of the Grand Harry Canyon.

"We could fill it with water," Harry said.

"Actually, that will probably happen anyway," Hermione said. "The soil is six feet deep with an artificial water table. We'll have to compensate for the water flowing in here."

"Well, I guess there's a reason for us to practice charms," Harry suggested.

"Maybe we can eventually build some canoes or a bridge across," Menelaus put in. "But for now, I'm going to step back. Just until you're done."

"Okay, second try," Hermione said to her best friend. "Go long, instead of big."

"Right," Harry said, casting again. He had memorized the incantation earlier that day, but had only been working on smaller containers until this first casting. He managed to make a planter have enough space for a gigantic root system. They had thought he had enough practice for the real thing and it seemed that now, yes, he had. Or at least after his false start. This time, the lights were tiny specks of white above and green below. Unfortunately he'd also dragged the other side of his pit along with it, leaving more of a crater than the canyon from before.

"Okay, I'm going to transfigure a fence around the edge," Hermione said.

"Want me to try?" Harry asked.

"Maybe Hermione should do it," Menelaus cut in. "We don't really need the Great Wall of Harry."

"What?" Harry asked.

"Nevermind," Menelaus said. "Hermione?"

When an expansion charm is used to enlarge a space, magic sort of fills in the blanks between point A and point B. The final effect is as if the space between A and B was stretched out as long as possible without shrinking. This is why things like the Knight Bus, which could squeeze between buildings, other buses and traffic, were possible. That's all well and good if you depend on magic to make things move and, well, everything. The vault wasn't like that. The lights hadn't been replicated, leaving instead a gigantic empty section.

After a few moments, Harry summoned his broom and the two of them flew across the chasm.

"Harry, this has to be nearly a kilometer long and who knows how deep," Hermione gasped, her voice echoing off the walls.

"You did say you wanted me to put as much effort into it as possible," Harry reminded her. "So I did it like our lives depended on it, like when we were using the Time Turner and there were all those dementors."

Hermione gaped at him a bit.

"I just tried to make it as big as possible," Harry replied humbly as they landed on the other side.

"This seems a bit excessive."

The two teens turned to see Velma Greengrass, Daphne and Astoria's mother, standing behind them, having walked around from the other side. Harry just shrugged as if it was normal.

"It's also quite impressive," the woman continued. "But I can't help but notice we're missing many of the fixtures the rest of the room has."

She pointed up and sure enough, aside from pipes, there were no lights and no sprinklers in the enlarged space and those pipes curved upwards into the cathedral-like ceiling above Harry's impression of the Challenger Deep.

"I suppose I'll have to transfigure some," Harry said simply. "I guess I need to start looking at them to make sure I know how they work."

"Uh, right," Hermione said, still stunned by the sheer size of the place. "I'll, uh, go inscribe those rune arrays so it doesn't collapse."

"Okay, good luck," Harry said.

Unfortunately for the vault, the water pumps were designed specifically for a certain size structure. The extra length of pipe and increased demand would have normally crashed and broken right then and there, but for several days and nights the vault dwellers didn't even think of it. If not for Bill Weasley's warding schemes for preservation, the vault most likely wouldn't have been able to withstand the changes and would have failed miserably. The resulting stress of trying to pump up the steep inclines Harry created caused the pumps to make noises that told anyone, magical, or not, that they weren't working quite right. It was like listening to an underwater haunted house with added creepiness. Sally supplied the blueprints, and the Davis family (Elijah and Mary having hauled Tracey in for an extra wand) worked hard on transfiguring trash into replacement parts to build new, larger pumps, and the problem was solved. Luckily the Water Chip survived the whole thing. Who knew what would have happened if they had to go find a replacement?

A few days later, Harry, Bjorn and Menelaus teamed up to install transfigured lights and sprinklers.

"Are you sure this is safe?" Bjorn asked. The two of them were hovering on brooms, the Norwegian man much less steady than Harry.

"Yes, I've fallen off lots of times, and I'm still fine," Harry said.

"That's not the kind of thing I want to hear," Bjorn replied. "I've been studying physics for some time, and the gravity of the situation is in the forefront of my mind."

"That was a horrible pun," Menelaus called up from below them as he constructed the light kits from spare parts. Harry (who had experience with repairs from his time at the Dursley's) and Bjorn (who had some experience in construction and wiring from summer construction work), were supposed to install the lights at steady intervals.

"I would rather not fall to my death," Bjorn replied. "Riding a very thin stick of wood makes me nervous. Why didn't you get some of your schoolmates to do this?"

"None of them have the right know-how," Harry explained as he flew over to pass the nervous man a new light.

"How about we build walkways and stairs? That would be safe right?" Bjorn asked, not moving to take the light-fixture. His hands were clinging to the broom handle so hard his knuckles were the color of fresh Lofoten snow.

"That would look nice in the long run, wouldn't it?" Harry said.

"Yes, and we could anchor the lights to the underside of the walkways with nice, sturdy guard rails and maybe even cages to keep people from falling over the edge," Bjorn replied.

"It'll take a bit longer," Harry replied.

"Will I have to fly?"

"Probably not," Harry answered.

"Then it would be the correct decision," Bjorn stated in a tone that allowed for no argument.

"I guess I'll never know why some people don't like to fly," Harry said as he flew down to Menelaus' work bench.

"If we were meant to fly, we'd have evolved wings!" Bjorn called out from above.

* * *

People came by and gaped at the creation. Between Harry, Bjorn, Menelaus and an inquisitive Ollivander, they'd transfigured and anchored a walkway around the whole pit. Stairs went up from there and made a number of levels around it, going higher and higher until  
"That should do it," Ollivander said as the stone walkway with iron safety grate was finished. He smiled down at Harry. "I knew when you found that wand we could expect great things from you, Harry. I'm glad to have once more been proven right."

"I just-" Harry broke off the conversation as the two of them relaxed on the edge of the pit. The sprinklers from far above started up, making it seem like night rain trickling down from the sky.

"Mr. Potter, there is no shame in doing what one can," the old man said. "You are strong magically. There is no denying that. You've done feats few adults can claim, much less a boy of fifteen. Don't belittle your gifts with false humility. What was it, that boy said a while ago? That day in the tents?" Ollivander paused and smiled kindly. "Ah, yes. 'With Great Power comes Great Responsibility,' I believe it was."

"Yeah," Harry said.

"I'm not saying you have to become a braggart, as that's just too far in the other direction," Ollivander explained. "But be honest about your abilities, if only to yourself. This and the other stories I've heard speak well of your sense of will, the strength of your character and the raw power at your control. And just think, one day this pit might be a place families go to play, to spend a day at a lake, much as people do above ground."

"Thanks," Harry said. "I don't try to do this, but I..." he trailed off for a moment. "I do what I have to. I always have."

"And you do it well," Ollivander said. "Now then, lend an old man an arm. I'm afraid this is quite a walk for a man of my advanced years."

"Sorry-"

"Do not apologize, Mr. Potter," Ollivander cautioned. "You are not responsible for my being old. I have only myself to blame."

Harry grinned and helped him back to his shop.

* * *

**Next Time: ** Bombs fall, everybody dies.


End file.
